Strengthening Critical Infrastructure: Combined Heat and Power at Wastewater Treatment Facilities (Webinar) – November 15, 2011

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

This webinar provides information about CHP at wastewater treatment facilities (WWTFs), including advantages and challenges, financial incentives and funding programs, and technical and economic potential.

Facilities | Hydrogen and Fuel Cells | NREL

Science.gov Websites

integration research. Photo of the Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility building, with hydrogen fueling station and fuel cell vehicles. Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility The Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility (HITRF) at the ESIF combines electrolyzers, a

A Study to Compare the Failure Rates of Current Space Shuttle Ground Support Equipment with the New Pathfinder Equipment and Investigate the Effect that the Proposed GSE Infrastructure Upgrade Might Have to Reduce GSE Infrastructure Failures

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kennedy, Barbara J.

2004-01-01

The purposes of this study are to compare the current Space Shuttle Ground Support Equipment (GSE) infrastructure with the proposed GSE infrastructure upgrade modification. The methodology will include analyzing the first prototype installation equipment at Launch PAD B called the "Pathfinder". This study will begin by comparing the failure rate of the current components associated with the "Hardware interface module (HIM)" at the Kennedy Space Center to the failure rate of the neW Pathfinder components. Quantitative data will be gathered specifically on HIM components and the PAD B Hypergolic Fuel facility and Hypergolic Oxidizer facility areas which has the upgraded pathfinder equipment installed. The proposed upgrades include utilizing industrial controlled modules, software, and a fiber optic network. The results of this study provide evidence that there is a significant difference in the failure rates of the two studied infrastructure equipment components. There is also evidence that the support staff for each infrastructure system is not equal. A recommendation to continue with future upgrades is based on a significant reduction of failures in the new' installed ground system components.

The impact of transportation infrastructure on bicycling injuries and crashes: a review of the literature

PubMed Central

2009-01-01

Background Bicycling has the potential to improve fitness, diminish obesity, and reduce noise, air pollution, and greenhouse gases associated with travel. However, bicyclists incur a higher risk of injuries requiring hospitalization than motor vehicle occupants. Therefore, understanding ways of making bicycling safer and increasing rates of bicycling are important to improving population health. There is a growing body of research examining transportation infrastructure and the risk of injury to bicyclists. Methods We reviewed studies of the impact of transportation infrastructure on bicyclist safety. The results were tabulated within two categories of infrastructure, namely that at intersections (e.g. roundabouts, traffic lights) or between intersections on "straightaways" (e.g. bike lanes or paths). To assess safety, studies examining the following outcomes were included: injuries; injury severity; and crashes (collisions and/or falls). Results The literature to date on transportation infrastructure and cyclist safety is limited by the incomplete range of facilities studied and difficulties in controlling for exposure to risk. However, evidence from the 23 papers reviewed (eight that examined intersections and 15 that examined straightaways) suggests that infrastructure influences injury and crash risk. Intersection studies focused mainly on roundabouts. They found that multi-lane roundabouts can significantly increase risk to bicyclists unless a separated cycle track is included in the design. Studies of straightaways grouped facilities into few categories, such that facilities with potentially different risks may have been classified within a single category. Results to date suggest that sidewalks and multi-use trails pose the highest risk, major roads are more hazardous than minor roads, and the presence of bicycle facilities (e.g. on-road bike routes, on-road marked bike lanes, and off-road bike paths) was associated with the lowest risk. Conclusion Evidence is beginning to accumulate that purpose-built bicycle-specific facilities reduce crashes and injuries among cyclists, providing the basis for initial transportation engineering guidelines for cyclist safety. Street lighting, paved surfaces, and low-angled grades are additional factors that appear to improve cyclist safety. Future research examining a greater variety of infrastructure would allow development of more detailed guidelines. PMID:19845962

Evaluating Commercial and Private Cloud Services for Facility-Scale Geodetic Data Access, Analysis, and Services

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Meertens, C. M.; Boler, F. M.; Ertz, D. J.; Mencin, D.; Phillips, D.; Baker, S.

2017-12-01

UNAVCO, in its role as a NSF facility for geodetic infrastructure and data, has succeeded for over two decades using on-premises infrastructure, and while the promise of cloud-based infrastructure is well-established, significant questions about suitability of such infrastructure for facility-scale services remain. Primarily through the GeoSciCloud award from NSF EarthCube, UNAVCO is investigating the costs, advantages, and disadvantages of providing its geodetic data and services in the cloud versus using UNAVCO's on-premises infrastructure. (IRIS is a collaborator on the project and is performing its own suite of investigations). In contrast to the 2-3 year time scale for the research cycle, the time scale of operation and planning for NSF facilities is for a minimum of five years and for some services extends to a decade or more. Planning for on-premises infrastructure is deliberate, and migrations typically take months to years to fully implement. Migrations to a cloud environment can only go forward with similar deliberate planning and understanding of all costs and benefits. The EarthCube GeoSciCloud project is intended to address the uncertainties of facility-level operations in the cloud. Investigations are being performed in a commercial cloud environment (Amazon AWS) during the first year of the project and in a private cloud environment (NSF XSEDE resource at the Texas Advanced Computing Center) during the second year. These investigations are expected to illuminate the potential as well as the limitations of running facility scale production services in the cloud. The work includes running parallel equivalent cloud-based services to on premises services and includes: data serving via ftp from a large data store, operation of a metadata database, production scale processing of multiple months of geodetic data, web services delivery of quality checked data and products, large-scale compute services for event post-processing, and serving real time data from a network of 700-plus GPS stations. The evaluation is based on a suite of metrics that we have developed to elucidate the effectiveness of cloud-based services in price, performance, and management. Services are currently running in AWS and evaluation is underway.

Decline in Radiation Hardened Microcircuit Infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

LaBel, Kenneth A.

2015-01-01

Two areas of radiation hardened microcircuit infrastructure will be discussed: 1) The availability and performance of radiation hardened microcircuits, and, and 2) The access to radiation test facilities primarily for proton single event effects (SEE) testing. Other areas not discussed, but are a concern include: The challenge for maintaining radiation effects tool access for assurance purposes, and, the access to radiation test facilities primarily for heavy ion single event effects (SEE) testing. Status and implications will be discussed for each area.

A knowledge infrastructure for occupational safety and health.

PubMed

van Dijk, Frank J H; Verbeek, Jos H; Hoving, Jan L; Hulshof, Carel T J

2010-12-01

Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) professionals should use scientific evidence to support their decisions in policy and practice. Although examples from practice show that progress has been made in evidence-based decision making, there is a challenge to improve and extend the facilities that support knowledge translation in practice. A knowledge infrastructure that supports OSH practice should include scientific research, systematic reviews, practice guidelines, and other tools for professionals such as well accessible virtual libraries and databases providing knowledge, quality tools, and good learning materials. A good infrastructure connects facilities with each other and with practice. Training and education is needed for OSH professionals in the use of evidence to improve effectiveness and efficiency. New initiatives show that occupational health can profit from intensified international collaboration to establish a good functioning knowledge infrastructure.

Department of Energy Arm Facilities on the North Slope of Alaska and Plans for a North Slope "Mega-Site"

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ivey, M.; Verlinde, J.

2014-12-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), through its scientific user facility, the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility, provides scientific infrastructure and data to the international Arctic research community via its research sites located on the North Slope of Alaska. The DOE ARM Program has operated an atmospheric measurement facility in Barrow, Alaska, since 1998. Major upgrades to this facility, including scanning radars, were added in 2010. Facilities and infrastructure to support operations of unmanned aerial systems for science missions in the Arctic and North Slope of Alaska were established at Oliktok Point Alaska in 2013. Tethered instrumented balloons will be used in the near future to make measurements of clouds in the boundary layer including mixed-phase clouds. The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility is implementing "mega-sites" at the Southern Great Plains and North Slope of Alaska sites. Two workshops were held to gather input from the scientific community on these mega-sites. The NSA workshop was held September 10 and 11 in the Washington DC area. The workshops included discussions of additional profiling remote sensors, detailed measurements of the land-atmosphere interface, aerial operations to link the Barrow and Oliktok sites, unmanned aerial system measurements, and routine large eddy simulation model runs. The "mega-sites" represent a significant new scientific and infrastructure investment by DOE Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research. This poster will present information on plans for a North Slope "Megasite" as well as new opportunities for members of the arctic research community to make atmospheric measurements using unmanned aerial systems or tethered balloons in conjunction with the DOE ARM facilities on the North Slope of Alaska.

NHERI: Advancing the Research Infrastructure of the Multi-Hazard Community

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Blain, C. A.; Ramirez, J. A.; Bobet, A.; Browning, J.; Edge, B.; Holmes, W.; Johnson, D.; Robertson, I.; Smith, T.; Zuo, D.

2017-12-01

The Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI), supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), is a distributed, multi-user national facility that provides the natural hazards research community with access to an advanced research infrastructure. Components of NHERI are comprised of a Network Coordination Office (NCO), a cloud-based cyberinfrastructure (DesignSafe-CI), a computational modeling and simulation center (SimCenter), and eight Experimental Facilities (EFs), including a post-disaster, rapid response research facility (RAPID). Utimately NHERI enables researchers to explore and test ground-breaking concepts to protect homes, businesses and infrastructure lifelines from earthquakes, windstorms, tsunamis, and surge enabling innovations to help prevent natural hazards from becoming societal disasters. When coupled with education and community outreach, NHERI will facilitate research and educational advances that contribute knowledge and innovation toward improving the resiliency of the nation's civil infrastructure to withstand natural hazards. The unique capabilities and coordinating activities over Year 1 between NHERI's DesignSafe-CI, the SimCenter, and individual EFs will be presented. Basic descriptions of each component are also found at https://www.designsafe-ci.org/facilities/. Additionally to be discussed are the various roles of the NCO in leading development of a 5-year multi-hazard science plan, coordinating facility scheduling and fostering the sharing of technical knowledge and best practices, leading education and outreach programs such as the recent Summer Institute and multi-facility REU program, ensuring a platform for technology transfer to practicing engineers, and developing strategic national and international partnerships to support a diverse multi-hazard research and user community.

Improving water, sanitation and hygiene in health-care facilities, Liberia.

PubMed

Abrampah, Nana Mensah; Montgomery, Maggie; Baller, April; Ndivo, Francis; Gasasira, Alex; Cooper, Catherine; Frescas, Ruben; Gordon, Bruce; Syed, Shamsuzzoha Babar

2017-07-01

The lack of proper water and sanitation infrastructures and poor hygiene practices in health-care facilities reduces facilities' preparedness and response to disease outbreaks and decreases the communities' trust in the health services provided. To improve water and sanitation infrastructures and hygiene practices, the Liberian health ministry held multistakeholder meetings to develop a national water, sanitation and hygiene and environmental health package. A national train-the-trainer course was held for county environmental health technicians, which included infection prevention and control focal persons; the focal persons acted as change agents. In Liberia, only 45% of 701 surveyed health-care facilities had an improved water source in 2015, and only 27% of these health-care facilities had proper disposal for infectious waste. Local ownership, through engagement of local health workers, was introduced to ensure development and refinement of the package. In-county collaborations between health-care facilities, along with multisectoral collaboration, informed national level direction, which led to increased focus on water and sanitation infrastructures and uptake of hygiene practices to improve the overall quality of service delivery. National level leadership was important to identify a vision and create an enabling environment for changing the perception of water, sanitation and hygiene in health-care provision. The involvement of health workers was central to address basic infrastructure and hygiene practices in health-care facilities and they also worked as stimulators for sustainable change. Further, developing a long-term implementation plan for national level initiatives is important to ensure sustainability.

Late-life depression in Rural China: do village infrastructure and availability of community resources matter?

PubMed

Li, Lydia W; Liu, Jinyu; Zhang, Zhenmei; Xu, Hongwei

2015-07-01

This study aimed to examine whether physical infrastructure and availability of three types of community resources (old-age income support, healthcare facilities, and elder activity centers) in rural villages are associated with depressive symptoms among older adults in rural China. Data were from the 2011 baseline survey of the Chinese Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS). The sample included 3824 older adults aged 60 years or older residing in 301 rural villages across China. A score of 12 on the 10-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale was used as the cutoff for depressed versus not depressed. Village infrastructure was indicated by an index summing deficiency in six areas: drinking water, fuel, road, sewage, waste management, and toilet facilities. Three dichotomous variables indicated whether income support, healthcare facility, and elder activity center were available in the village. Respondents' demographic characteristics (age, gender, marital status, and living arrangements), health status (chronic conditions and physical disability), and socioeconomic status (education, support from children, health insurance, household luxury items, and housing quality) were covariates. Multilevel logistic regression was conducted. Controlling for individuals' socioeconomic status, health status, and demographic characteristics, village infrastructure deficiency was positively associated with the odds of being depressed among rural older Chinese, whereas the provision of income support and healthcare facilities in rural villages was associated with lower odds. Village infrastructure and availability of community resources matter for depressive symptoms in rural older adults. Improving infrastructure, providing old-age income support, and establishing healthcare facilities in villages could be effective strategies to prevent late-life depression in rural China. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Cost-Benefit Analysis of Green Infrastructures on Community Stormwater Reduction and Utilization: A Case of Beijing, China.

PubMed

Liu, Wen; Chen, Weiping; Feng, Qi; Peng, Chi; Kang, Peng

2016-12-01

Cost-benefit analysis is demanded for guiding the plan, design and construction of green infrastructure practices in rapidly urbanized regions. We developed a framework to calculate the costs and benefits of different green infrastructures on stormwater reduction and utilization. A typical community of 54,783 m 2 in Beijing was selected for case study. For the four designed green infrastructure scenarios (green space depression, porous brick pavement, storage pond, and their combination), the average annual costs of green infrastructure facilities are ranged from 40.54 to 110.31 thousand yuan, and the average of the cost per m 3 stormwater reduction and utilization is 4.61 yuan. The total average annual benefits of stormwater reduction and utilization by green infrastructures of the community are ranged from 63.24 to 250.15 thousand yuan, and the benefit per m 3 stormwater reduction and utilization is ranged from 5.78 to 11.14 yuan. The average ratio of average annual benefit to cost of four green infrastructure facilities is 1.91. The integrated facilities had the highest economic feasibility with a benefit to cost ratio of 2.27, and followed by the storage pond construction with a benefit to cost ratio of 2.14. The results suggested that while the stormwater reduction and utilization by green infrastructures had higher construction and maintenance costs, their comprehensive benefits including source water replacements benefits, environmental benefits and avoided cost benefits are potentially interesting. The green infrastructure practices should be promoted for sustainable management of urban stormwater.

Energy Storage Laboratory | Energy Systems Integration Facility | NREL

Science.gov Websites

technologies. Key Infrastructure Energy storage system inverter, energy storage system simulators, research Plug-In Vehicles/Mobile Storage The plug-in vehicles/mobile storage hub includes connections for small integration. Key Infrastructure Ample house power, REDB access, charging stations, easy vehicle parking access

48 CFR 252.246-7004 - Safety of Facilities, Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

...: SAFETY OF FACILITIES, INFRASTRUCTURE, AND EQUIPMENT FOR MILITARY OPERATIONS (OCT 2010) (a) Definition... 48 Federal Acquisition Regulations System 3 2011-10-01 2011-10-01 false Safety of Facilities, Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations. 252.246-7004 Section 252.246-7004 Federal Acquisition...

48 CFR 246.270 - Safety of facilities, infrastructure, and equipment for military operations.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... ASSURANCE Contract Quality Requirements 246.270 Safety of facilities, infrastructure, and equipment for... 48 Federal Acquisition Regulations System 3 2011-10-01 2011-10-01 false Safety of facilities, infrastructure, and equipment for military operations. 246.270 Section 246.270 Federal Acquisition Regulations...

Scientific Infrastructure To Support Manned And Unmanned Aircraft, Tethered Balloons, And Related Aerial Activities At Doe Arm Facilities On The North Slope Of Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ivey, M.; Dexheimer, D.; Hardesty, J.; Lucero, D. A.; Helsel, F.

2015-12-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), through its scientific user facility, the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) facilities, provides scientific infrastructure and data to the international Arctic research community via its research sites located on the North Slope of Alaska. DOE has recently invested in improvements to facilities and infrastructure to support operations of unmanned aerial systems for science missions in the Arctic and North Slope of Alaska. A new ground facility, the Third ARM Mobile Facility, was installed at Oliktok Point Alaska in 2013. Tethered instrumented balloons were used to make measurements of clouds in the boundary layer including mixed-phase clouds. A new Special Use Airspace was granted to DOE in 2015 to support science missions in international airspace in the Arctic. Warning Area W-220 is managed by Sandia National Laboratories for DOE Office of Science/BER. W-220 was successfully used for the first time in July 2015 in conjunction with Restricted Area R-2204 and a connecting Altitude Reservation Corridor (ALTRV) to permit unmanned aircraft to operate north of Oliktok Point. Small unmanned aircraft (DataHawks) and tethered balloons were flown at Oliktok during the summer and fall of 2015. This poster will discuss how principal investigators may apply for use of these Special Use Airspaces, acquire data from the Third ARM Mobile Facility, or bring their own instrumentation for deployment at Oliktok Point, Alaska. The printed poster will include the standard DOE funding statement.

Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) and Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE): Conceptual Design Report. Volume 3: Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility for DUNE

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Strait, James; McCluskey, Elaine; Lundin, Tracy

2016-01-21

This volume of the LBNF/DUNE Conceptual Design Report covers the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility for DUNE and describes the LBNF Project, which includes design and construction of the beamline at Fermilab, the conventional facilities at both Fermilab and SURF, and the cryostat and cryogenics infrastructure required for the DUNE far detector.

Energy Systems Integration Laboratory | Energy Systems Integration Facility

Science.gov Websites

systems test hub includes a Class 1, Division 2 space for performing tests of high-pressure hydrogen Laboratory offers the following capabilities. High-Pressure Hydrogen Systems The high-pressure hydrogen infrastructure. Key Infrastructure Robotic arm; high-pressure hydrogen; natural gas supply; standalone SCADA

75 FR 16080 - Notice of Intent To Prepare an Environmental Impact Statement for Basewide Water Infrastructure...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-03-31

...- design and to develop additional alternatives for analysis. These two water infrastructure projects are... carbon, and reverse osmosis. The facility would be designed in modular form for ease of expandability... lighting, asphalt pavement, and pavement marking and signs. The project includes ``100-year storm'' flood...

Managing a tier-2 computer centre with a private cloud infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bagnasco, Stefano; Berzano, Dario; Brunetti, Riccardo; Lusso, Stefano; Vallero, Sara

2014-06-01

In a typical scientific computing centre, several applications coexist and share a single physical infrastructure. An underlying Private Cloud infrastructure eases the management and maintenance of such heterogeneous applications (such as multipurpose or application-specific batch farms, Grid sites, interactive data analysis facilities and others), allowing dynamic allocation resources to any application. Furthermore, the maintenance of large deployments of complex and rapidly evolving middleware and application software is eased by the use of virtual images and contextualization techniques. Such infrastructures are being deployed in some large centres (see e.g. the CERN Agile Infrastructure project), but with several open-source tools reaching maturity this is becoming viable also for smaller sites. In this contribution we describe the Private Cloud infrastructure at the INFN-Torino Computer Centre, that hosts a full-fledged WLCG Tier-2 centre, an Interactive Analysis Facility for the ALICE experiment at the CERN LHC and several smaller scientific computing applications. The private cloud building blocks include the OpenNebula software stack, the GlusterFS filesystem and the OpenWRT Linux distribution (used for network virtualization); a future integration into a federated higher-level infrastructure is made possible by exposing commonly used APIs like EC2 and OCCI.

Autonomous rendezvous and capture development infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bryan, Thomas C.; Roe, Fred; Coker, Cindy; Nelson, Pam; Johnson, B.

1991-01-01

In the development of the technology for autonomous rendezvous and docking, key infrastructure capabilities must be used for effective and economical development. This involves facility capabilities, both equipment and personnel, to devise, develop, qualify, and integrate ARD elements and subsystems into flight programs. One effective way of reducing technical risks in developing ARD technology is the use of the ultimate test facility, using a Shuttle-based reusable free-flying testbed to perform a Technology Demonstration Test Flight which can be structured to include a variety of additional sensors, control schemes, and operational approaches. This conceptual testbed and flight demonstration will be used to illustrate how technologies and facilities at MSFC can be used to develop and prove an ARD system.

Solid waste management complex site development plan

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Greager, T.M.

1994-09-30

The main purpose of this Solid Waste Management Complex Site Development Plan is to optimize the location of future solid waste treatment and storage facilities and the infrastructure required to support them. An overall site plan is recommended. Further, a series of layouts are included that depict site conditions as facilities are constructed at the SWMC site. In this respect the report serves not only as the siting basis for future projects, but provides siting guidance for Project W-112, as well. The plan is intended to function as a template for expected growth of the site over the next 30more » years so that future facilities and infrastructure will be properly integrated.« less

Developing measurement indices to enhance protection and resilience of critical infrastructure and key resources.

PubMed

Fisher, Ronald E; Norman, Michael

2010-07-01

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is developing indices to better assist in the risk management of critical infrastructures. The first of these indices is the Protective Measures Index - a quantitative index that measures overall protection across component categories: physical security, security management, security force, information sharing, protective measures and dependencies. The Protective Measures Index, which can also be recalculated as the Vulnerability Index, is a way to compare differing protective measures (eg fence versus security training). The second of these indices is the Resilience Index, which assesses a site's resilience and consists of three primary components: robustness, resourcefulness and recovery. The third index is the Criticality Index, which assesses the importance of a facility. The Criticality Index includes economic, human, governance and mass evacuation impacts. The Protective Measures Index, Resilience Index and Criticality Index are being developed as part of the Enhanced Critical Infrastructure Protection initiative that DHS protective security advisers implement across the nation at critical facilities. This paper describes two core themes: determination of the vulnerability, resilience and criticality of a facility and comparison of the indices at different facilities.

Safely Managed Sanitation for All Means Fecal Sludge Management for At Least 1.8 Billion People in Low and Middle Income Countries.

PubMed

Berendes, David M; Sumner, Trent A; Brown, Joe M

2017-03-07

Although global access to sanitation is increasing, safe management of fecal waste is a rapidly growing challenge in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The goal of this study was to evaluate the current need for fecal sludge management (FSM) in LMICs by region, urban/rural status, and wealth. Recent Demographic and Health Survey data from 58 countries (847 685 surveys) were used to classify households by sanitation facility (facilities needing FSM, sewered facilities, ecological sanitation/other, or no facilities). Onsite piped water infrastructure was quantified to approximate need for wastewater management and downstream treatment. Over all surveyed nations, 63% of households used facilities requiring FSM, totaling approximately 1.8 billion people. Rural areas had similar proportions of toilets requiring FSM as urban areas. FSM needs scaled inversely with wealth: in the poorest quintile, households' sanitation facilities were almost 170 times more likely to require FSM (vs sewerage) than in the richest quintile. About one out of five households needing FSM had onsite piped water infrastructure, indicating domestic or reticulated wastewater infrastructure may be required if lacking for safe management of aqueous waste streams. FSM strategies must be included in future sanitation investment to achieve safe management of fecal wastes and protect public health.

Dynamic Modeling and Evaluation of Recurring Infrastructure Maintenance Budget Determination Methods

DTIC Science & Technology

2005-03-01

represent the annual M&R costs for the entire facility (Melvin, 1992). This method requires immense amounts of detailed data for each facility to be...and where facility and infrastructure maintenance must occur. Uzarski et al (1995) discuss that the data gathered produces a candidate list that can... facilities or an infrastructure plant. Government agencies like the DoD, major universities, and large corporations are the major players. Data

Landlord project multi-year program plan, fiscal year 1999, WBS 1.5

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dallas, M.D.

The MYWP technical baseline describes the work to be accomplished by the Project and the technical standards which govern that work. The mission of Landlord Project is to provide more maintenance replacement of general infrastructure facilities and systems to facilitate the Hanford Site cleanup mission. Also, once an infrastructure facility or system is no longer needed the Landlord Project transitions the facility to final closure/removal through excess, salvage or demolition. Landlord Project activities will be performed in an environmentally sound, safe, economical, prudent, and reliable manner. The Landlord Project consists of the following facilities systems: steam, water, liquid sanitary waste,more » electrical distribution, telecommunication, sanitary landfill, emergency services, general purpose offices, general purpose shops, general purpose warehouses, environmental supports facilities, roads, railroad, and the site land. The objectives for general infrastructure support are reflected in two specific areas, (1) Core Infrastructure Maintenance, and (2) Infrastructure Risk Mitigation.« less

Locations and attributes of utility-scale solar power facilities in Colorado and New Mexico, 2011

USGS Publications Warehouse

Ignizio, Drew A.; Carr, Natasha B.

2012-01-01

The data series consists of polygonal boundaries for utility-scale solar power facilities (both photovoltaic and concentrating solar power) located within Colorado and New Mexico as of December 2011. Attributes captured for each facility include the following: facility name, size/production capacity (in MW), type of solar technology employed, location, state, operational status, year the facility came online, and source identification information. Facility locations and perimeters were derived from 1-meter true-color aerial photographs (2011) produced by the National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP); the photographs have a positional accuracy of about ±5 meters (accessed from the NAIP GIS service: http://gis.apfo.usda.gov/arcgis/services). Solar facility perimeters represent the full extent of each solar facility site, unless otherwise noted. When visible, linear features such as fences or road lines were used to delineate the full extent of the solar facility. All related equipment including buildings, power substations, and other associated infrastructure were included within the solar facility. If solar infrastructure was indistinguishable from adjacent infrastructure, or if solar panels were installed on existing building tops, only the solar collecting equipment was digitized. The "Polygon" field indicates whether the "equipment footprint" or the full "site outline" was digitized. The spatial accuracy of features that represent site perimeters or an equipment footprint is estimated at +/- 10 meters. Facilities under construction or not fully visible in the NAIP imagery at the time of digitization (December 2011) are represented by an approximate site outline based on the best available information and documenting materials. The spatial accuracy of these facilities cannot be estimated without more up-to-date imagery – users are advised to consult more recent imagery as it becomes available. The "Status" field provides information about the operational status of each facility as of December 2011. This data series contributes to an Online Interactive Energy Atlas currently in development by the U.S. Geological Survey. The Energy Atlas will synthesize data on existing and potential energy development in Colorado and New Mexico and will include additional natural resource data layers. This information may be used by decision makers to evaluate and compare the potential benefits and tradeoffs associated with different energy development strategies or scenarios. Interactive maps, downloadable data layers, metadata, and decision support tools will be included in the Energy Atlas. The format of the Energy Atlas will facilitate the integration of information about energy with key terrestrial and aquatic resources for evaluating resource values and minimizing risks from energy development activities.

Improving water, sanitation and hygiene in health-care facilities, Liberia

PubMed Central

Montgomery, Maggie; Baller, April; Ndivo, Francis; Gasasira, Alex; Cooper, Catherine; Frescas, Ruben; Gordon, Bruce; Syed, Shamsuzzoha Babar

2017-01-01

Abstract Problem The lack of proper water and sanitation infrastructures and poor hygiene practices in health-care facilities reduces facilities’ preparedness and response to disease outbreaks and decreases the communities’ trust in the health services provided. Approach To improve water and sanitation infrastructures and hygiene practices, the Liberian health ministry held multistakeholder meetings to develop a national water, sanitation and hygiene and environmental health package. A national train-the-trainer course was held for county environmental health technicians, which included infection prevention and control focal persons; the focal persons acted as change agents. Local setting In Liberia, only 45% of 701 surveyed health-care facilities had an improved water source in 2015, and only 27% of these health-care facilities had proper disposal for infectious waste. Relevant changes Local ownership, through engagement of local health workers, was introduced to ensure development and refinement of the package. In-county collaborations between health-care facilities, along with multisectoral collaboration, informed national level direction, which led to increased focus on water and sanitation infrastructures and uptake of hygiene practices to improve the overall quality of service delivery. Lessons learnt National level leadership was important to identify a vision and create an enabling environment for changing the perception of water, sanitation and hygiene in health-care provision. The involvement of health workers was central to address basic infrastructure and hygiene practices in health-care facilities and they also worked as stimulators for sustainable change. Further, developing a long-term implementation plan for national level initiatives is important to ensure sustainability. PMID:28670017

Environmental Technology Verification Report: Grouts for Wastewater Collection Systems, Separation Systems Consultants Inc., GST3 Grout

EPA Science Inventory

Municipalities are discovering rapid degradation of infrastructures in wastewater collection and treatment facilities due to infiltration of leaking water from the surrounding environments. Rehabilitation of these facilities by in situ methods, including the use of grouting, is u...

Environmental Technology Verification Report: Grouts for Wastewater Collection Systems, Warren Environmental, Inc. 301-04 Epoxy Grout

EPA Science Inventory

Municipalities are discovering rapid degradation of infrastructures in wastewater collection and treatment facilities due to infiltration of leaking water from the surrounding environments. Rehabilitation of these facilities by in situ methods, including the use of grouting, is u...

AMF3 ARM's Research Facility at Oliktok Point Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Helsel, F.; Lucero, D. A.; Ivey, M.; Dexheimer, D.; Hardesty, J.; Roesler, E. L.

2015-12-01

Scientific Infrastructure To Support Atmospheric Science And Aerosol Science For The Department Of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Programs Mobile Facility 3 Located At Oliktok Point, Alaska.The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program's Mobile Facility 3 (AMF3) located at Oliktok Point, Alaska is a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) site. The site provides a scientific infrastructure and data archives for the international Arctic research community. The infrastructure at Oliktok is designed to be mobile and it may be relocated in the future to support other ARM science missions. AMF-3 instruments include: scanning precipitation Radar-cloud radar, Raman Lidar, Eddy correlation flux systems, Ceilometer, Balloon sounding system, Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI), Micro-pulse Lidar (MPL), Millimeter cloud radar along with all the standard metrological measurements. Data from these instruments is placed in the ARM data archives and are available to the international research community. This poster will discuss what instruments are at AMF3 and the challenges of powering an Arctic site without the use of grid power.

Green infrastructure in high-rise residential development on steep slopes in city of Vladivostok

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kopeva, Alla; Ivanova, Olga; Khrapko, Olga

2018-03-01

The purpose of this study is to identify the facilities of green infrastructure that are able to improve living conditions in an urban environment in high-rise residential apartments buildings on steep slopes in the city of Vladivostok. Based on the analysis of theoretical sources and practices that can be observed in the world, green infrastructure facilities have been identified. These facilities meet the criteria of the sustainable development concept, and can be used in the city of Vladivostok. They include green roofs, green walls, and greening of disturbed slopes. All the existing high-rise apartments buildings situated on steep slopes in the city of Vladivostok, have been studied. It is concluded that green infrastructure is necessary to be used in new projects connected with designing and constructing of residential apartments buildings on steep slopes, as well as when upgrading the projects that have already been implemented. That will help to regulate the ecological characteristics of the sites. The results of the research can become a basis for increasing the sustainability of the habitat, and will facilitate the adoption of decisions in the field of urban design and planning.

Autonomous rendezvous and capture development infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bryan, Thomas C.

1991-01-01

In the development of the technology for autonomous rendezvous and docking, key infrastructure capabilities must be used for effective and economical development. This need involves facility capabilities, both equipment and personnel, to devise, develop, qualify, and integrate ARD elements and subsystems into flight programs. One effective way of reducing technical risks in developing ARD technology is the use of the Low Earth Orbit test facility. Using a reusable free-flying testbed carried in the Shuttle, as a technology demonstration test flight, can be structured to include a variety of sensors, control schemes, and operational approaches. This testbed and flight demonstration concept will be used to illustrate how technologies and facilities at MSFC can be used to develop and prove an ARD system.

Onsite and Electric Backup Capabilities at Critical Infrastructure Facilities in the United States

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Phillips, Julia A.; Wallace, Kelly E.; Kudo, Terence Y.

2016-04-01

The following analysis, conducted by Argonne National Laboratory’s (Argonne’s) Risk and Infrastructure Science Center (RISC), details an analysis of electric power backup of national critical infrastructure as captured through the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS’s) Enhanced Critical Infrastructure Program (ECIP) Initiative. Between January 1, 2011, and September 2014, 3,174 ECIP facility surveys have been conducted. This study focused first on backup capabilities by infrastructure type and then expanded to infrastructure type by census region.

Sandia QIS Capabilities.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Muller, Richard P.

2017-07-01

Sandia National Laboratories has developed a broad set of capabilities in quantum information science (QIS), including elements of quantum computing, quantum communications, and quantum sensing. The Sandia QIS program is built atop unique DOE investments at the laboratories, including the MESA microelectronics fabrication facility, the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies (CINT) facilities (joint with LANL), the Ion Beam Laboratory, and ASC High Performance Computing (HPC) facilities. Sandia has invested $75 M of LDRD funding over 12 years to develop unique, differentiating capabilities that leverage these DOE infrastructure investments.

Nuclear Energy Infrastructure Database Description and User’s Manual

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Heidrich, Brenden

In 2014, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Science and Technology Innovation initiated the Nuclear Energy (NE)–Infrastructure Management Project by tasking the Nuclear Science User Facilities, formerly the Advanced Test Reactor National Scientific User Facility, to create a searchable and interactive database of all pertinent NE-supported and -related infrastructure. This database, known as the Nuclear Energy Infrastructure Database (NEID), is used for analyses to establish needs, redundancies, efficiencies, distributions, etc., to best understand the utility of NE’s infrastructure and inform the content of infrastructure calls. The Nuclear Science User Facilities developed the database by utilizing data and policy direction from amore » variety of reports from the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Research Council, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and various other federal and civilian resources. The NEID currently contains data on 802 research and development instruments housed in 377 facilities at 84 institutions in the United States and abroad. The effort to maintain and expand the database is ongoing. Detailed information on many facilities must be gathered from associated institutions and added to complete the database. The data must be validated and kept current to capture facility and instrumentation status as well as to cover new acquisitions and retirements. This document provides a short tutorial on the navigation of the NEID web portal at NSUF-Infrastructure.INL.gov.« less

INFN-Pisa scientific computation environment (GRID, HPC and Interactive Analysis)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arezzini, S.; Carboni, A.; Caruso, G.; Ciampa, A.; Coscetti, S.; Mazzoni, E.; Piras, S.

2014-06-01

The INFN-Pisa Tier2 infrastructure is described, optimized not only for GRID CPU and Storage access, but also for a more interactive use of the resources in order to provide good solutions for the final data analysis step. The Data Center, equipped with about 6700 production cores, permits the use of modern analysis techniques realized via advanced statistical tools (like RooFit and RooStat) implemented in multicore systems. In particular a POSIX file storage access integrated with standard SRM access is provided. Therefore the unified storage infrastructure is described, based on GPFS and Xrootd, used both for SRM data repository and interactive POSIX access. Such a common infrastructure allows a transparent access to the Tier2 data to the users for their interactive analysis. The organization of a specialized many cores CPU facility devoted to interactive analysis is also described along with the login mechanism integrated with the INFN-AAI (National INFN Infrastructure) to extend the site access and use to a geographical distributed community. Such infrastructure is used also for a national computing facility in use to the INFN theoretical community, it enables a synergic use of computing and storage resources. Our Center initially developed for the HEP community is now growing and includes also HPC resources fully integrated. In recent years has been installed and managed a cluster facility (1000 cores, parallel use via InfiniBand connection) and we are now updating this facility that will provide resources for all the intermediate level HPC computing needs of the INFN theoretical national community.

Scope of Work for Integration Management and Installation Services of the National Ignition Facility Beampath Infrastructure System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Coyle, P. D.

2000-03-01

The goal of the National Ignition Facility (NIF) project is to provide an above ground experimental capability for maintaining nuclear competence and weapons effects simulation and to provide a facility capable of achieving fusion ignition using solid-state lasers as the energy driver. The facility will incorporate 192 laser beams, which will be focused onto a small target located at the center of a spherical target chamber-the energy from the laser beams will be deposited in a few billionths of a second. The target will then implode, forcing atomic nuclei to sufficiently high temperatures and densities necessary to achieve a miniature fusion reaction. The NIF is under construction, at Livermore, California, located approximately 50 miles southeast of San Francisco, California. The University of California, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), operating under Prime Contract W-7405-ENG. 48 with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), shall subcontract for Integration Management and Installation (IMI) Services for the Beampath Infrastructure System (BIS). The BIS includes Beampath Hardware and Beampath Utilities. Conventional Facilities work for the NIF Laser and Target Area Building (LTAB) and Optics Assembly Building (OAB) is over 86 percent constructed. This Scope of Work is for Integration Management and Installation (IMI) Services corresponding to Management Services, Design Integration Services, Construction Services, and Commissioning Services for the NIB BIS. The BIS includes Beampath Hardware and Beampath Utilities. Beampath Hardware and Beampath Utilities include beampath vessels, enclosures, and beam tubes; auxiliary and utility systems; and support structures. A substantial amount of GFE will be provided by the University for installation as part of the infrastructure packages.

Transportation Infrastructure Robustness : Joint Engineering and Economic Analysis

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2017-11-01

The objectives of this study are to develop a methodology for assessing the robustness of transportation infrastructure facilities and assess the effect of damage to such facilities on travel demand and the facilities users welfare. The robustness...

JPL Facilities and Software for Collaborative Design: 1994 - Present

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

DeFlorio, Paul A.

2004-01-01

The viewgraph presentation provides an overview of the history of the JPL Project Design Center (PDC) and, since 2000, the Center for Space Mission Architecture and Design (CSMAD). The discussion includes PDC objectives and scope; mission design metrics; distributed design; a software architecture timeline; facility design principles; optimized design for group work; CSMAD plan view, facility design, and infrastructure; and distributed collaboration tools.

Walking behavior on Lapangan Merdeka district in Medan city

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zahrah, W.; Mandai, A. J. O.; Nasution, A. D.

2018-03-01

Lapangan Merdeka district in Medan City is an area with a lot of functions and activities. Pedestrians in this area pose particular behavior for walking. Such behavior can be formed due to certain factors. This study aimed to identify the behavior and motivation of walking, as well as knowing the perception of pedestrians on pedestrian facilities and infrastructures. This research is a qualitative descriptive study. This research was conducted in five streets that have pedestrian lanes by collecting data through observation of pedestrian facilities and infrastructures, as well as the distribution of questionnaires to investigate the characteristics of pedestrians, the behavior and motivation of walking, and perceptions of pedestrian facilities and infrastructure. The research found that the behavior of pedestrians when walking are different on certain characteristics of pedestrians as well as the specific conditions of facilities and infrastructures. The most dominant motivation when walking in this area is easy transportation access. The results of the perception of pedestrians also show that pedestrian facilities and infrastructure are good in this area.

50 CFR 86.136 - What must be in the plan?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... (CONTINUED) FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE-WILDLIFE SPORT FISH RESTORATION PROGRAM BOATING INFRASTRUCTURE GRANT (BIG... problems. (e) Include information about the longevity of current tie-up facilities. ...

The Department of Energy Nuclear Criticality Safety Program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Felty, James R.

2005-05-01

This paper broadly covers key events and activities from which the Department of Energy Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP) evolved. The NCSP maintains fundamental infrastructure that supports operational criticality safety programs. This infrastructure includes continued development and maintenance of key calculational tools, differential and integral data measurements, benchmark compilation, development of training resources, hands-on training, and web-based systems to enhance information preservation and dissemination. The NCSP was initiated in response to Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board Recommendation 97-2, Criticality Safety, and evolved from a predecessor program, the Nuclear Criticality Predictability Program, that was initiated in response to Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board Recommendation 93-2, The Need for Critical Experiment Capability. This paper also discusses the role Dr. Sol Pearlstein played in helping the Department of Energy lay the foundation for a robust and enduring criticality safety infrastructure.

Land Cover and Topography Affect the Land Transformation Caused by Wind Facilities

PubMed Central

Diffendorfer, Jay E.; Compton, Roger W.

2014-01-01

Land transformation (ha of surface disturbance/MW) associated with wind facilities shows wide variation in its reported values. In addition, no studies have attempted to explain the variation across facilities. We digitized land transformation at 39 wind facilities using high resolution aerial imagery. We then modeled the effects of turbine size, configuration, land cover, and topography on the levels of land transformation at three spatial scales. The scales included strings (turbines with intervening roads only), sites (strings with roads connecting them, buried cables and other infrastructure), and entire facilities (sites and the roads or transmission lines connecting them to existing infrastructure). An information theoretic modeling approach indicated land cover and topography were well-supported variables affecting land transformation, but not turbine size or configuration. Tilled landscapes, despite larger distances between turbines, had lower average land transformation, while facilities in forested landscapes generally had the highest land transformation. At site and string scales, flat topographies had the lowest land transformation, while facilities on mesas had the largest. The results indicate the landscape in which the facilities are placed affects the levels of land transformation associated with wind energy. This creates opportunities for optimizing wind energy production while minimizing land cover change. In addition, the results indicate forecasting the impacts of wind energy on land transformation should include the geographic variables affecting land transformation reported here. PMID:24558449

Land cover and topography affect the land transformation caused by wind facilities

USGS Publications Warehouse

Diffendorfer, Jay E.; Compton, Roger W.

2014-01-01

Land transformation (ha of surface disturbance/MW) associated with wind facilities shows wide variation in its reported values. In addition, no studies have attempted to explain the variation across facilities. We digitized land transformation at 39 wind facilities using high resolution aerial imagery. We then modeled the effects of turbine size, configuration, land cover, and topography on the levels of land transformation at three spatial scales. The scales included strings (turbines with intervening roads only), sites (strings with roads connecting them, buried cables and other infrastructure), and entire facilities (sites and the roads or transmission lines connecting them to existing infrastructure). An information theoretic modeling approach indicated land cover and topography were well-supported variables affecting land transformation, but not turbine size or configuration. Tilled landscapes, despite larger distances between turbines, had lower average land transformation, while facilities in forested landscapes generally had the highest land transformation. At site and string scales, flat topographies had the lowest land transformation, while facilities on mesas had the largest. The results indicate the landscape in which the facilities are placed affects the levels of land transformation associated with wind energy. This creates opportunities for optimizing wind energy production while minimizing land cover change. In addition, the results indicate forecasting the impacts of wind energy on land transformation should include the geographic variables affecting land transformation reported here.

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2002

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2002-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2002 (NTAD2002) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2010

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2010-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2010 (NTAD2010) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2006

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2006-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2006 (NTAD2006) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2005

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2005-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2005 (NTAD2005) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2008

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2008 (NTAD2008) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2003

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2003-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2003 (NTAD2003) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2004

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2004-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2004 (NTAD2004) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2009

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2009 (NTAD2009) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2007

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2007-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2007 (NTAD2007) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2012

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2012 (NTAD2012) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2011

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2011 (NTAD2011) is a set of nationwide geographic databases of transportation facilities, transportation networks, and associated infrastructure. These datasets include spatial information for transportatio...

Control System Applicable Use Assessment of the Secure Computing Corporation - Secure Firewall (Sidewinder)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hadley, Mark D.; Clements, Samuel L.

2009-01-01

Battelle’s National Security & Defense objective is, “applying unmatched expertise and unique facilities to deliver homeland security solutions. From detection and protection against weapons of mass destruction to emergency preparedness/response and protection of critical infrastructure, we are working with industry and government to integrate policy, operational, technological, and logistical parameters that will secure a safe future”. In an ongoing effort to meet this mission, engagements with industry that are intended to improve operational and technical attributes of commercial solutions that are related to national security initiatives are necessary. This necessity will ensure that capabilities for protecting critical infrastructure assets aremore » considered by commercial entities in their development, design, and deployment lifecycles thus addressing the alignment of identified deficiencies and improvements needed to support national cyber security initiatives. The Secure Firewall (Sidewinder) appliance by Secure Computing was assessed for applicable use in critical infrastructure control system environments, such as electric power, nuclear and other facilities containing critical systems that require augmented protection from cyber threat. The testing was performed in the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory’s (PNNL) Electric Infrastructure Operations Center (EIOC). The Secure Firewall was tested in a network configuration that emulates a typical control center network and then evaluated. A number of observations and recommendations are included in this report relating to features currently included in the Secure Firewall that support critical infrastructure security needs.« less

Association between infrastructure and observed quality of care in 4 healthcare services: A cross-sectional study of 4,300 facilities in 8 countries

PubMed Central

Sun, Zeye

2017-01-01

Background It is increasingly apparent that access to healthcare without adequate quality of care is insufficient to improve population health outcomes. We assess whether the most commonly measured attribute of health facilities in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)—the structural inputs to care—predicts the clinical quality of care provided to patients. Methods and findings Service Provision Assessments are nationally representative health facility surveys conducted by the Demographic and Health Survey Program with support from the US Agency for International Development. These surveys assess health system capacity in LMICs. We drew data from assessments conducted in 8 countries between 2007 and 2015: Haiti, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda. The surveys included an audit of facility infrastructure and direct observation of family planning, antenatal care (ANC), sick-child care, and (in 2 countries) labor and delivery. To measure structural inputs, we constructed indices that measured World Health Organization-recommended amenities, equipment, and medications in each service. For clinical quality, we used data from direct observations of care to calculate providers’ adherence to evidence-based care guidelines. We assessed the correlation between these metrics and used spline models to test for the presence of a minimum input threshold associated with good clinical quality. Inclusion criteria were met by 32,531 observations of care in 4,354 facilities. Facilities demonstrated moderate levels of infrastructure, ranging from 0.63 of 1 in sick-child care to 0.75 of 1 for family planning on average. Adherence to evidence-based guidelines was low, with an average of 37% adherence in sick-child care, 46% in family planning, 60% in labor and delivery, and 61% in ANC. Correlation between infrastructure and evidence-based care was low (median 0.20, range from −0.03 for family planning in Senegal to 0.40 for ANC in Tanzania). Facilities with similar infrastructure scores delivered care of widely varying quality in each service. We did not detect a minimum level of infrastructure that was reliably associated with higher quality of care delivered in any service. These findings rely on cross-sectional data, preventing assessment of relationships between structural inputs and clinical quality over time; measurement error may attenuate the estimated associations. Conclusion Inputs to care are poorly correlated with provision of evidence-based care in these 4 clinical services. Healthcare workers in well-equipped facilities often provided poor care and vice versa. While it is important to have strong infrastructure, it should not be used as a measure of quality. Insight into health system quality requires measurement of processes and outcomes of care. PMID:29232377

Association between infrastructure and observed quality of care in 4 healthcare services: A cross-sectional study of 4,300 facilities in 8 countries.

PubMed

Leslie, Hannah H; Sun, Zeye; Kruk, Margaret E

2017-12-01

It is increasingly apparent that access to healthcare without adequate quality of care is insufficient to improve population health outcomes. We assess whether the most commonly measured attribute of health facilities in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)-the structural inputs to care-predicts the clinical quality of care provided to patients. Service Provision Assessments are nationally representative health facility surveys conducted by the Demographic and Health Survey Program with support from the US Agency for International Development. These surveys assess health system capacity in LMICs. We drew data from assessments conducted in 8 countries between 2007 and 2015: Haiti, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda. The surveys included an audit of facility infrastructure and direct observation of family planning, antenatal care (ANC), sick-child care, and (in 2 countries) labor and delivery. To measure structural inputs, we constructed indices that measured World Health Organization-recommended amenities, equipment, and medications in each service. For clinical quality, we used data from direct observations of care to calculate providers' adherence to evidence-based care guidelines. We assessed the correlation between these metrics and used spline models to test for the presence of a minimum input threshold associated with good clinical quality. Inclusion criteria were met by 32,531 observations of care in 4,354 facilities. Facilities demonstrated moderate levels of infrastructure, ranging from 0.63 of 1 in sick-child care to 0.75 of 1 for family planning on average. Adherence to evidence-based guidelines was low, with an average of 37% adherence in sick-child care, 46% in family planning, 60% in labor and delivery, and 61% in ANC. Correlation between infrastructure and evidence-based care was low (median 0.20, range from -0.03 for family planning in Senegal to 0.40 for ANC in Tanzania). Facilities with similar infrastructure scores delivered care of widely varying quality in each service. We did not detect a minimum level of infrastructure that was reliably associated with higher quality of care delivered in any service. These findings rely on cross-sectional data, preventing assessment of relationships between structural inputs and clinical quality over time; measurement error may attenuate the estimated associations. Inputs to care are poorly correlated with provision of evidence-based care in these 4 clinical services. Healthcare workers in well-equipped facilities often provided poor care and vice versa. While it is important to have strong infrastructure, it should not be used as a measure of quality. Insight into health system quality requires measurement of processes and outcomes of care.

Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

None

2017-04-10

Learn about the Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility (HITRF), where NREL researchers are working on vehicle and hydrogen infrastructure projects that aim to enable more rapid inclusion of fuel cell and hydrogen technologies in the market to meet consumer and national goals for emissions reduction, performance, and energy security. As part of NREL’s Energy Systems Integration Facility (ESIF), the HITRF is designed for collaboration with a wide range of hydrogen, fuel cell, and transportation stakeholders.

Changes in the Arctic: Background and Issues for Congress

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-05-12

discovery of new oil and gas deposits far from existing storage, pipelines , and shipping facilities cannot be developed until infrastructure is built...markets. Other questions in need of answers include the status of port, pipeline , and liquid natural gas infrastructure; whether methane hydrates...Changes to the Arctic brought about by warming temperatures will likely allow more exploration for oil, gas , and minerals. Warming that causes

Evolution of the Virtualized HPC Infrastructure of Novosibirsk Scientific Center

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Adakin, A.; Anisenkov, A.; Belov, S.; Chubarov, D.; Kalyuzhny, V.; Kaplin, V.; Korol, A.; Kuchin, N.; Lomakin, S.; Nikultsev, V.; Skovpen, K.; Sukharev, A.; Zaytsev, A.

2012-12-01

Novosibirsk Scientific Center (NSC), also known worldwide as Akademgorodok, is one of the largest Russian scientific centers hosting Novosibirsk State University (NSU) and more than 35 research organizations of the Siberian Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences including Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics (BINP), Institute of Computational Technologies, and Institute of Computational Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics (ICM&MG). Since each institute has specific requirements on the architecture of computing farms involved in its research field, currently we've got several computing facilities hosted by NSC institutes, each optimized for a particular set of tasks, of which the largest are the NSU Supercomputer Center, Siberian Supercomputer Center (ICM&MG), and a Grid Computing Facility of BINP. A dedicated optical network with the initial bandwidth of 10 Gb/s connecting these three facilities was built in order to make it possible to share the computing resources among the research communities, thus increasing the efficiency of operating the existing computing facilities and offering a common platform for building the computing infrastructure for future scientific projects. Unification of the computing infrastructure is achieved by extensive use of virtualization technology based on XEN and KVM platforms. This contribution gives a thorough review of the present status and future development prospects for the NSC virtualized computing infrastructure and the experience gained while using it for running production data analysis jobs related to HEP experiments being carried out at BINP, especially the KEDR detector experiment at the VEPP-4M electron-positron collider.

Use of the Homeland-Defense Operational Planning System (HOPS) for Emergency Management

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Durling, Jr., R L; Price, D E

2005-12-16

The Homeland-Defense Operational Planning System (HOPS), is a new operational planning tool leveraging Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's expertise in weapons systems and in sparse information analysis to support the defense of the U.S. homeland. HOPS provides planners with a basis to make decisions to protect against acts of terrorism, focusing on the defense of facilities critical to U.S. infrastructure. Criticality of facilities, structures, and systems is evaluated on a composite matrix of specific projected casualty, economic, and sociopolitical impact bins. Based on these criteria, significant unidentified vulnerabilities are identified and secured. To provide insight into potential successes by malevolent actors,more » HOPS analysts strive to base their efforts mainly on unclassified open-source data. However, more cooperation is needed between HOPS analysts and facility representatives to provide an advantage to those whose task is to defend these facilities. Evaluated facilities include: refineries, major ports, nuclear power plants and other nuclear licensees, dams, government installations, convention centers, sports stadiums, tourist venues, and public and freight transportation systems. A generalized summary of analyses of U.S. infrastructure facilities will be presented.« less

Risk Assessment Using The Homeland-Defense Operational Planning System (HOPS)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Price, D E; Durling, R L

2005-10-10

The Homeland-Defense Operational Planning System (HOPS), is a new operational planning tool leveraging Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's expertise in weapons systems and in sparse information analysis to support the defense of the U.S. homeland. HOPS provides planners with a basis to make decisions to protect against acts of terrorism, focusing on the defense of facilities critical to U.S. infrastructure. Criticality of facilities, structures, and systems is evaluated on a composite matrix of specific projected casualty, economic, and sociopolitical impact bins. Based on these criteria, significant unidentified vulnerabilities are identified and secured. To provide insight into potential successes by malevolent actors,more » HOPS analysts strive to base their efforts mainly on unclassified open-source data. However, more cooperation is needed between HOPS analysts and facility representatives to provide an advantage to those whose task is to defend these facilities. Evaluated facilities include: refineries, major ports, nuclear power plants and other nuclear licensees, dams, government installations, convention centers, sports stadiums, tourist venues, and public and freight transportation systems. A generalized summary of analyses of U.S. infrastructure facilities will be presented.« less

Automated rendezvous and capture development infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bryan, Thomas C.; Roe, Fred; Coker, Cynthia

1992-01-01

The facilities at Marshall Space Flight Center and JSC to be utilized to develop and test an autonomous rendezvous and capture (ARC) system are described. This includes equipment and personnel facility capabilities to devise, develop, qualify, and integrate ARC elements and subsystems into flight programs. Attention is given to the use of a LEO test facility, the current concept and unique system elements of the ARC, and the options available to develop ARC technology.

Systems engineering considerations for operational support systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aller, Robert O.

1993-01-01

Operations support as considered here is the infrastructure of people, procedures, facilities and systems that provide NASA with the capability to conduct space missions. This infrastructure involves most of the Centers but is concentrated principally at the Johnson Space Center, the Kennedy Space Center, the Goddard Space Flight Center, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It includes mission training and planning, launch and recovery, mission control, tracking, communications, data retrieval and data processing.

Managing NIF safety equipment in a high neutron and gamma radiation environment.

PubMed

Datte, Philip; Eckart, Mark; Jackson, Mark; Khater, Hesham; Manuel, Stacie; Newton, Mark

2013-06-01

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) is a 192 laser beam facility that supports the Inertial Confinement Fusion program. During the ignition experimental campaign, the NIF is expected to perform shots with varying fusion yield producing 14 MeV neutrons up to 20 MJ or 7.1 × 10(18) neutrons per shot and a maximum annual yield of 1,200 MJ. Several infrastructure support systems will be exposed to varying high yield shots over the facility's 30-y life span. In response to this potential exposure, analysis and testing of several facility safety systems have been conducted. A detailed MCNP (Monte Carlo N-Particle Transport Code) model has been developed for the NIF facility, and it includes most of the major structures inside the Target Bay. The model has been used in the simulation of expected neutron and gamma fluences throughout the Target Bay. Radiation susceptible components were identified and tested to fluences greater than 10(13) (n cm(-2)) for 14 MeV neutrons and γ-ray equivalent. The testing includes component irradiation using a 60Co gamma source and accelerator-based irradiation using 4- and 14- MeV neutron sources. The subsystem implementation in the facility is based on the fluence estimates after shielding and survivability guidelines derived from the dose maps and component tests results. This paper reports on the evaluation and implementation of mitigations for several infrastructure safety support systems, including video, oxygen monitoring, pressure monitors, water sensing systems, and access control interfaces found at the NIF.

Guidelines and Standards for the Technology Infrastructure of 21st Century Educational Facilities.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

New York State Education Dept., Albany. Office of Facilities Planning.

New York State Regents directed that new guidelines and "standards" be developed for technology infrastructures in educational facilities in order to assist administrators and educators in planning technology integration during retrofits, renovations, or new construction of educational facilities. This document provides the first draft…

Infrastructural challenges to better health in maternity facilities in rural Kenya: community and healthworker perceptions.

PubMed

Essendi, Hildah; Johnson, Fiifi Amoako; Madise, Nyovani; Matthews, Zoe; Falkingham, Jane; Bahaj, Abubakr S; James, Patrick; Blunden, Luke

2015-11-09

The efforts and commitments to accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals for maternal and newborn health (MDGs 4 and 5) in low and middle income countries have focused primarily on providing key medical interventions at maternity facilities to save the lives of women at the time of childbirth, as well as their babies. However, in most rural communities in sub-Saharan, access to maternal and newborn care services is still limited and even where services are available they often lack the infrastructural prerequisites to function at the very basic level in providing essential routine health care services, let alone emergency care. Lists of essential interventions for normal and complicated childbirth, do not take into account these prerequisites, thus the needs of most health facilities in rural communities are ignored, although there is enough evidence that maternal and newborn deaths continue to remain unacceptably high in these areas. This study uses data gathered through qualitative interviews in Kitonyoni and Mwania sub-locations of Makueni County in Eastern Kenya to understand community and provider perceptions of the obstacles faced in providing and accessing maternal and newborn care at health facilities in their localities. The study finds that the community perceives various challenges, most of which are infrastructural, including lack of electricity, water and poor roads that adversely impact the provision and access to essential life-saving maternal and newborn care services in the two sub-locations. The findings and recommendations from this study are important for the attention of policy makers and programme managers in order to improve the state of lower-tier health facilities serving rural communities and to strengthen infrastructure with the aim of making basic routine and emergency obstetric and newborn care services more accessible.

"Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Research Facility at Oliktok Point Alaska"

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Helsel, F.; Ivey, M.; Hardesty, J.; Roesler, E. L.; Dexheimer, D.

2017-12-01

Scientific Infrastructure To Support Atmospheric Science, Aerosol Science and UAS's for The Department Of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Programs At The Mobile Facility 3 Located At Oliktok Point, Alaska.The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program's Mobile Facility 3 (AMF3) located at Oliktok Point, Alaska is a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) site designed to collect data and help determine the impact that clouds and aerosols have on solar radiation. AMF3 provides a scientific infrastructure to support instruments and collect arctic data for the international arctic research community. The infrastructure at AMF3/Oliktok is designed to be mobile and it may be relocated in the future to support other ARM science missions. AMF3's present base line instruments include: scanning precipitation Radars, cloud Radar, Raman Lidar, Eddy correlation flux systems, Ceilometer, Balloon sounding system, Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI), Micro-pulse Lidar (MPL) Along with all the standard metrological measurements. In addition AMF3 provides aerosol measurements with a Mobile Aerosol Observing System (MAOS). Ground support for Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) and tethered balloon flights. Data from these instruments and systems are placed in the ARM data archives and are available to the international research community. This poster will discuss what instruments and systems are at the ARM Research Facility at Oliktok Point Alaska.

Driver Education for New Multimodal Facilities

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-05-24

Local and state transportation agencies are redesigning roads to accommodate multimodal travel, including the addition of new configurations, infrastructures, and rules that may be unfamiliar to current drivers and other road users. Education and out...

3D Surveying, Modeling and Geo-Information System of the New Campus of ITB-Indonesia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Suwardhi, D.; Trisyanti, S. W.; Ainiyah, N.; Fajri, M. N.; Hanan, H.; Virtriana, R.; Edmarani, A. A.

2016-10-01

The new campus of ITB-Indonesia, which is located at Jatinangor, requires good facilities and infrastructures to supporting all of campus activities. Those can not be separated from procurement and maintenance activities. Technology for procurement and maintenance of facilities and infrastructures -based computer (information system)- has been known as Building Information Modeling (BIM). Nowadays, that technology is more affordable with some of free software that easy to use and tailored to user needs. BIM has some disadvantages and it requires other technologies to complete it, namely Geographic Information System (GIS). BIM and GIS require surveying data to visualized landscape and buildings on Jatinangor ITB campus. This paper presents the on-going of an internal service program conducted by the researcher, academic staff and students for the university. The program including 3D surveying to support the data requirements for 3D modeling of buildings in CityGML and Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) data model. The entire 3D surveying will produce point clouds that can be used to make 3D model. The 3D modeling is divided into low and high levels of detail modeling. The low levels model is stored in 3D CityGML database, and the high levels model including interiors is stored in BIM Server. 3D model can be used to visualized the building and site of Jatinangor ITB campus. For facility management of campus, an geo-information system is developed that can be used for planning, constructing, and maintaining Jatinangor ITB's facilities and infrastructures. The system uses openMAINT, an open source solution for the Property & Facility Management.

The Facilities Audit. A Process for Improving Facilities Conditions.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kaiser, Harvey H.

The problems of deferred maintenance and decaying campus infrastructure have troubled higher education for the past two decades. This book, designed to be a tool for facilities managers, describes a process for inspecting and reporting conditions of buildings and infrastructure. The audit process is meant to be a routine part of maintenance…

Network information attacks on the control systems of power facilities belonging to the critical infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Loginov, E. L.; Raikov, A. N.

2015-04-01

The most large-scale accidents occurred as a consequence of network information attacks on the control systems of power facilities belonging to the United States' critical infrastructure are analyzed in the context of possibilities available in modern decision support systems. Trends in the development of technologies for inflicting damage to smart grids are formulated. A volume matrix of parameters characterizing attacks on facilities is constructed. A model describing the performance of a critical infrastructure's control system after an attack is developed. The recently adopted measures and legislation acts aimed at achieving more efficient protection of critical infrastructure are considered. Approaches to cognitive modeling and networked expertise of intricate situations for supporting the decision-making process, and to setting up a system of indicators for anticipatory monitoring of critical infrastructure are proposed.

Customer Satisfaction versus Infrastructural Facilities in the Realm of Higher Education--A Case Study of Sri Venkateswara University Tirupati

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Janardhana, G.; Rajasekhar, Mamilla

2012-01-01

This article analyses the levels of students' satisfaction and how institution provides infrastructure facilities in the field of higher education. Infrastructure is the fastest growing segment of the higher education scenario. Universities play a very vital role in a country in terms of their potential. It contributes to employment and growth.…

77 FR 63850 - Rate Adjustments for Indian Irrigation Projects

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-10-17

... the reliable operation of the irrigation facility infrastructure; (h) Maintenance of a vehicle and... Willow Creek O&M (includes Agency, Lodge Grass 1, Lodge Grass 2, Reno, Upper Little Horn, and Forty Mile...

Integrating multiple scientific computing needs via a Private Cloud infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bagnasco, S.; Berzano, D.; Brunetti, R.; Lusso, S.; Vallero, S.

2014-06-01

In a typical scientific computing centre, diverse applications coexist and share a single physical infrastructure. An underlying Private Cloud facility eases the management and maintenance of heterogeneous use cases such as multipurpose or application-specific batch farms, Grid sites catering to different communities, parallel interactive data analysis facilities and others. It allows to dynamically and efficiently allocate resources to any application and to tailor the virtual machines according to the applications' requirements. Furthermore, the maintenance of large deployments of complex and rapidly evolving middleware and application software is eased by the use of virtual images and contextualization techniques; for example, rolling updates can be performed easily and minimizing the downtime. In this contribution we describe the Private Cloud infrastructure at the INFN-Torino Computer Centre, that hosts a full-fledged WLCG Tier-2 site and a dynamically expandable PROOF-based Interactive Analysis Facility for the ALICE experiment at the CERN LHC and several smaller scientific computing applications. The Private Cloud building blocks include the OpenNebula software stack, the GlusterFS filesystem (used in two different configurations for worker- and service-class hypervisors) and the OpenWRT Linux distribution (used for network virtualization). A future integration into a federated higher-level infrastructure is made possible by exposing commonly used APIs like EC2 and by using mainstream contextualization tools like CloudInit.

Twenty-Five Year Site Plan FY2013 - FY2037

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jones, William H.

2012-07-12

Los Alamos National Laboratory (the Laboratory) is the nation's premier national security science laboratory. Its mission is to develop and apply science and technology to ensure the safety, security, and reliability of the United States (U.S.) nuclear stockpile; reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction, proliferation, and terrorism; and solve national problems in defense, energy, and the environment. The fiscal year (FY) 2013-2037 Twenty-Five Year Site Plan (TYSP) is a vital component for planning to meet the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) commitment to ensure the U.S. has a safe, secure, and reliable nuclear deterrent. The Laboratory also usesmore » the TYSP as an integrated planning tool to guide development of an efficient and responsive infrastructure that effectively supports the Laboratory's missions and workforce. Emphasizing the Laboratory's core capabilities, this TYSP reflects the Laboratory's role as a prominent contributor to NNSA missions through its programs and campaigns. The Laboratory is aligned with Nuclear Security Enterprise (NSE) modernization activities outlined in the NNSA Strategic Plan (May 2011) which include: (1) ensuring laboratory plutonium space effectively supports pit manufacturing and enterprise-wide special nuclear materials consolidation; (2) constructing the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF); (3) establishing shared user facilities to more cost effectively manage high-value, experimental, computational and production capabilities; and (4) modernizing enduring facilities while reducing the excess facility footprint. Th is TYSP is viewed by the Laboratory as a vital planning tool to develop an effi cient and responsive infrastructure. Long range facility and infrastructure development planning are critical to assure sustainment and modernization. Out-year re-investment is essential for sustaining existing facilities, and will be re-evaluated on an annual basis. At the same time, major modernization projects will require new line-item funding. This document is, in essence, a roadmap that defines a path forward for the Laboratory to modernize, streamline, consolidate, and sustain its infrastructure to meet its national security mission.« less

Biomedical Waste Management : An Infrastructural Survey of Hospitals.

PubMed

Rao, Skm; Ranyal, R K; Bhatia, S S; Sharma, V R

2004-10-01

The Ministry of Environment & Forests notified the Biomedical Waste (management & handling) Rules, 1998" (BMW Mgt) in July 1998. In accordance with the rules, every hospital generating BMW needs to set up requisite BMW treatment facilities on site or ensure requisite treatment of waste at common treatment facility. No untreated BMW shall be kept stored beyond a period of 48 hours. The cost of construction, operation and maintenance of system for managing BMW represents a significant part of overall budget of a hospital if the BMW rules have to be implemented in their true spirit. Two types of costs are required to be incurred by hospitals for BMW Mgt, internal and external. Internal cost is the cost for segregation, mutilation, disinfection, internal storage and transportation including hidden cost of protective equipment. External costs are off site transportation, treatment and final disposal. A study of hospitals was carried out from various sectors like Govt, Private, Charitable institutions etc. to assess the infrastructural requirement for BMW Mgt. Cost was worked out for a hospital where all the infrastructure as per each and every requirement of BMW rules had been implemented and then it was compared with other hospitals where hospitals have made compromises on each stage of BMW Mgt. Capital cost incurred by benchmarked hospital of 1047 beds was Rs.3 lakh 59 thousand excluding cost of incinerator and hospital is incurring Rs. 656/- per day as recurring expenditure. Pune city has common regional facility for BMW final disposal. Facility is charging Rs.20 per kg of infectious waste. As on Dec 2001 there were 400 institutions including nursing homes, labs and blood banks which were registered. After analyzing the results of study it was felt that there is an urgent need to standardize the infrastructural requirement so that hospitals following BMW rules strictly do not suffer additional costs.

Empowering low-income community in Kampong settlement by exploring people's activities in surrounding environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bawole, Paulus; Sutanto, Haryati B.

2017-11-01

Urban Kampong is a spontaneous settlement growing in several big cities within developing countries including Indonesia. This settlement is developed by low-income people without any plan. Therefore there is no specific housing pattern in the settlement. The characteristics of the settlements is dominated by Javanese traditional roof typology and narrow path with minimal public open spaces. People's creativity in building their houses often uses second hand building materials that make their houses look specific. Besides, infrastructure facilities within Kampong Settlement are very poor. Because the poor living in Urban Kampong have to adjust their live with minimum infrastructure facilities available, they have to be creative in using all facilities available. Through the creativities of low-income people living in Urban Kampong the research will show how the inhabitants can be empowered by exploring inhabitant's creativities and consequently the environmental quality within Urban Kampong can be improved as well.

Life-cycle Economic and Environmental Effects of Green, Gray and Hybrid Stormwater Infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stokes-Draut, J. R.; Taptich, M. N.; Horvath, A.

2016-12-01

Cities throughout the U.S. are seeking efficient ways to manage stormwater for many reasons, including flood control, pollution management, water supply augmentation and to prepare for a changing climate. Traditionally, cities have relied primarily on gray infrastructure, namely sewers, storage and treatment facilities. In these systems, urban runoff, its volume increasing as impervious surfaces expand, is channeled to a wastewater plant where it is mixed with raw sewage prior to treatment or it is discharged, generally untreated, to local water bodies. These facilities are inflexible and expensive to build and maintain. Many systems are deteriorating and/or approaching, if not exceeding, their design capacity. Increasingly, more innovative approaches that integrate stormwater management into the natural environment and that make sense at both local and regional scales are sought. Identifying the best stormwater solution will require evaluating the life-cycle economic costs associated with these alternatives, including costs associated with construction, operation, and maintenance including regulatory and permitting costs, financing, as well as other indirect costs (e.g., avoided wastewater processing or system capacity expansion, increased property value) and non-economic co-benefits (i.e, aesthetics, habitat provision). Beyond conventional life-cycle costing, applying life-cycle assessment (LCA) will contribute to more holistic and sustainable decision-making. LCA can be used to quantitatively track energy use, greenhouse gas emissions, and other environmental effects associated with constructing, operating, and maintaining green and gray infrastructure, including supply chain contributions. We will present the current state of knowledge for implementing life-cycle costing and LCA into stormwater management decisions for green, gray and hybrid infrastructure.

Reduction of Neonatal Mortality Requires Strengthening of the Health System: A Situational Analysis of Neonatal Care Services in Ballabgarh.

PubMed

Gosain, Mudita; Goel, Akhil D; Kharya, Pradeep; Agarwal, Ramesh; Amarchand, Ritvik; Rai, Sanjay K; Kapoor, Suresh; Paul, Vinod K; Krishnan, Anand

2017-10-01

Planning a comprehensive program addressing neonatal mortality will require a detailed situational analysis of available neonatal-specific health infrastructure. We identified facilities providing essential and sick neonatal care (ENC, SNC) by a snowballing technique in Ballabgarh Block. These were assessed for infrastructure, human resource and equipment along with self-rated competency of the staff and compared with facility-based or population-based norms. A total of 35 facilities providing ENC and 10 facilities for SNC were identified. ENC services were largely in the public-sector domain (68.5% of births) and were well distributed in the block. SNC burden was largely being borne by the private sector (66% of admissions), which was urban-based. The private sector and nurses reported lower competency especially for SNC. Only 53.9% of government facilities and 17.5% of private facilities had a fully equipped newborn care corner. Serious efforts to reduce neonatal mortality would require major capacity strengthening of the health system, including that of the private sector. © The Author [2017]. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com

48 CFR 252.246-7004 - Safety of Facilities, Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

..., Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations. As prescribed in 246.270-4, use the following clause... contract comply with Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) 1-200-01 for— (1) Fire protection; (2) Structural...

48 CFR 252.246-7004 - Safety of Facilities, Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

..., Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations. As prescribed in 246.270-4, use the following clause... contract comply with Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) 1-200-01 for— (1) Fire protection; (2) Structural...

48 CFR 252.246-7004 - Safety of Facilities, Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

..., Infrastructure, and Equipment for Military Operations. As prescribed in 246.270-4, use the following clause... contract comply with Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) 1-200-01 for— (1) Fire protection; (2) Structural...

Uncertainty in Predicted Neighborhood-Scale Green Stormwater Infrastructure Performance Informed by field monitoring of Hydrologic Abstractions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Smalls-Mantey, L.; Jeffers, S.; Montalto, F. A.

2013-12-01

Human alterations to the environment provide infrastructure for housing and transportation but have drastically changed local hydrology. Excess stormwater runoff from impervious surfaces generates erosion, overburdens sewer infrastructure, and can pollute receiving bodies. Increased attention to green stormwater management controls is based on the premise that some of these issues can be mitigated by capturing or slowing the flow of stormwater. However, our ability to predict actual green infrastructure facility performance using physical or statistical methods needs additional validation, and efforts to incorporate green infrastructure controls into hydrologic models are still in their infancy stages. We use more than three years of field monitoring data to derive facility specific probability density functions characterizing the hydrologic abstractions provided by a stormwater treatment wetland, streetside bioretention facility, and a green roof. The monitoring results are normalized by impervious area treated, and incorporated into a neighborhood-scale agent model allowing probabilistic comparisons of the stormwater capture outcomes associated with alternative urban greening scenarios. Specifically, we compare the uncertainty introduced into the model by facility performance (as represented by the variability in the abstraction), to that introduced by both precipitation variability, and spatial patterns of emergence of different types of green infrastructure. The modeling results are used to update a discussion about the potential effectiveness of urban green infrastructure implementation plans.

The Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clements, G. R.; Willcoxon, R. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

NASA is building the Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC) to provide a 'national resource' for the research, development, demonstration, testing, and qualification of Spaceport and Range Technologies. The ATDC will be located at Space Launch Complex 20 (SLC-20) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) in Florida. SLC-20 currently provides a processing and launch capability for small-scale rockets; this capability will be augmented with additional ATDC facilities to provide a comprehensive and integrated in situ environment. Examples of Spaceport Technologies that will be supported by ATDC infrastructure include densified cryogenic systems, intelligent automated umbilicals, integrated vehicle health management systems, next-generation safety systems, and advanced range systems. The ATDC can be thought of as a prototype spaceport where industry, government, and academia, in partnership, can work together to improve safety of future space initiatives. The ATDC is being deployed in five separate phases. Major ATDC facilities will include a Liquid Oxygen Area; a Liquid Hydrogen Area, a Liquid Nitrogen Area, and a multipurpose Launch Mount; 'Iron Rocket' Test Demonstrator; a Processing Facility with a Checkout and Control System; and Future Infrastructure Developments. Initial ATDC development will be completed in 2006.

Deficiencies in the availability of essential musculoskeletal surgical services at 883 health facilities in 24 low- and lower-middle-income countries.

PubMed

Spiegel, D A; Nduaguba, A; Cherian, M N; Monono, M; Kelley, E T

2015-06-01

The sequelae of acute musculoskeletal conditions, especially injuries and infections, are responsible for significant disability in low- and middle-income countries. This study characterizes the availability of selected musculoskeletal surgical services at different tiers of the health system in a convenience sample of 883 health facilities from 24 low- and lower-middle-income countries. Selected data points from the World Health Organization's (WHO) tool of situational analysis of surgical availability were extracted from the WHO's database in December, 2013. These included infrastructure, physical resources and supplies, interventions, and human resources. For a descriptive analysis, facilities were divided into two groups based on number of beds (<100, 100-300, and >300) and level of facility (primary referral, secondary/tertiary, and Private/NGO/Mission). Statistical comparison was made between public and Private/NGO/Mission facilities based on number of beds (≤100, 100-300, and >300) using a Chi-Square analysis, with statistical significance at p < 0.05. Significant deficiencies were noted in infrastructure, physical resources and supplies, and human resources for the provision of essential orthopedic surgical services at all tiers of the health system. Availability was significantly lower in public versus Private/NGO/Mission facilities for nearly all categories in facilities with ≤100 beds, and in a subset of measures in facilities with between 100 and 300 beds. Deficiencies in the availability of orthopedic surgical services were observed at all levels of health facility and were most pronounced at facilities with ≤100 beds in the public sector. Strengthening the delivery of essential surgical services, including orthopedics, at the primary referral level must be prioritized if we are to reduce the burden of death and disability from a variety of emergent health conditions. There were no sources of funding.

Integration of bicycling and walking facilities into the infrastructure of urban communities : [research brief].

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-02-01

Many manuals, handbooks and web resources exist that provide guidance on planning for and designing bicycle and pedestrian facilities. However few of these resources emphasize program and infrastructure characteristics most desired by current (and po...

Measuring facility capability to provide routine and emergency childbirth care to mothers and newborns: An appeal to adjust for delivery caseload of facilities

PubMed Central

Allen, Stephanie M.; Opondo, Charles; Campbell, Oona M. R.

2017-01-01

Background Measurement of Emergency Obstetric Care capability is common, and measurement of newborn and overall routine childbirth care has begun in recent years. These assessments of facility capabilities can be used to identify geographic inequalities in access to functional health services and to monitor improvements over time. This paper develops an approach for monitoring the childbirth environment that accounts for the delivery caseload of the facility. Methods We used data from the Kenya Service Provision Assessment to examine facility capability to provide quality childbirth care, including infrastructure, routine maternal and newborn care, and emergency obstetric and newborn care. A facility was considered capable of providing a function if necessary tracer items were present and, for emergency functions, if the function had been performed in the previous three months. We weighted facility capability by delivery caseload, and compared results with those generated using traditional “survey weights”. Results Of the 403 facilities providing childbirth care, the proportion meeting criteria for capability were: 13% for general infrastructure, 6% for basic emergency obstetric care, 3% for basic emergency newborn care, 13% and 11% for routine maternal and newborn care, respectively. When the new caseload weights accounting for delivery volume were applied, capability improved and the proportions of deliveries occurring in a facility meeting capability criteria were: 51% for general infrastructure, 46% for basic emergency obstetric care, 12% for basic emergency newborn care, 36% and 18% for routine maternal and newborn care, respectively. This is because most of the caseload was in hospitals, which generally had better capability. Despite these findings, fewer than 2% of deliveries occurred in a facility capable of providing all functions. Conclusion Reporting on the percentage of facilities capable of providing certain functions misrepresents the capacity to provide care at the national level. Delivery caseload weights allow adjustment for patient volume, and shift the denominator of measurement from facilities to individual deliveries, leading to a better representation of the context in which facility births take place. These methods could lead to more standardized national datasets, enhancing their ability to inform policy at a national and international level. PMID:29049412

The Australian Replacement Research Reactor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kennedy, Shane; Robinson, Robert

2004-03-01

The 20-MW Australian Replacement Research Reactor represents possibly the greatest single research infrastructure investment in Australia's history. Construction of the facility has commenced, following award of the construction contract in July 2000, and the construction licence in April 2002. The project includes a large state-of-the-art liquid deuterium cold-neutron source and supermirror guides feeding a large modern guide hall, in which most of the instruments are placed. Alongside the guide hall, there is good provision of laboratory, office and space for support activities. While the facility has "space" for up to 18 instruments, the project has funding for an initial set of 8 instruments, which will be ready when the reactor is fully operational in July 2006. Instrument performance will be competitive with the best research-reactor facilities anywhere, and our goal is to be in the top 3 such facilities worldwide. Staff to lead the design effort and man these instruments have been hired on the international market from leading overseas facilities, and from within Australia, and 7 out of 8 instruments have been specified and costed. At present the instrumentation project carries 10contingency. An extensive dialogue has taken place with the domestic user community and our international peers, via various means including a series of workshops over the last 2 years covering all 8 instruments, emerging areas of application like biology and the earth sciences, and computing infrastructure for the instruments.

KSC-2011-7851

NASA Image and Video Library

2011-11-21

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Members of the media tour several facilities, including the Multi-Payload Processing Facility, during the 21st Century Ground Systems Program Tour at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Other tour stops were the Launch Equipment Test Facility, the Operations & Checkout Building and the Canister Rotation Facility. NASA’s 21st Century Ground Systems Program was initiated at Kennedy Space Center to establish the needed launch and processing infrastructure to support the Space Launch System Program and to work toward transforming the landscape of the launch site for a multi-faceted user community. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann

KSC-2011-7846

NASA Image and Video Library

2011-11-21

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Members of the media tour several facilities, including the Launch Equipment Test Facility in the Industrial Area, during the 21st Century Ground Systems Program Tour at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Other tour stops were the Operations & Checkout Building, the Multi-Payload Processing Facility and the Canister Rotation Facility. NASA’s 21st Century Ground Systems Program was initiated at Kennedy Space Center to establish the needed launch and processing infrastructure to support the Space Launch System Program and to work toward transforming the landscape of the launch site for a multi-faceted user community. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann

KSC-2011-7847

NASA Image and Video Library

2011-11-21

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Members of the media tour several facilities, including the Launch Equipment Test Facility in the Industrial Area, during the 21st Century Ground Systems Program Tour at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Other tour stops were the Operations & Checkout Building, the Multi-Payload Processing Facility and the Canister Rotation Facility. NASA’s 21st Century Ground Systems Program was initiated at Kennedy Space Center to establish the needed launch and processing infrastructure to support the Space Launch System Program and to work toward transforming the landscape of the launch site for a multi-faceted user community. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann

Strategies for 96-hour critical infrastructure compliance.

PubMed

Storbakken, Steven H; Kendall, Shannon; Lackey, Connie

2009-01-01

Organizations that stand the best chance at survival following a disaster do so because they can depend on the sharing of resources and mutual ideologies, the authors claim, pointing out that when it comes to strategizing for 96-hour critical infrastructure compliance, it is important to keep at the forefront not only the idea of collaborative planning from within the organization--involving security and safety, clinical, facilities and administrative staffs--but also includes collaborative planning with the local and regional businesses surrounding the organization.

The AuScope geodetic VLBI array

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lovell, J. E. J.; McCallum, J. N.; Reid, P. B.; McCulloch, P. M.; Baynes, B. E.; Dickey, J. M.; Shabala, S. S.; Watson, C. S.; Titov, O.; Ruddick, R.; Twilley, R.; Reynolds, C.; Tingay, S. J.; Shield, P.; Adada, R.; Ellingsen, S. P.; Morgan, J. S.; Bignall, H. E.

2013-06-01

The AuScope geodetic Very Long Baseline Interferometry array consists of three new 12-m radio telescopes and a correlation facility in Australia. The telescopes at Hobart (Tasmania), Katherine (Northern Territory) and Yarragadee (Western Australia) are co-located with other space geodetic techniques including Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) and gravity infrastructure, and in the case of Yarragadee, satellite laser ranging (SLR) and Doppler Orbitography and Radiopositioning Integrated by Satellite (DORIS) facilities. The correlation facility is based in Perth (Western Australia). This new facility will make significant contributions to improving the densification of the International Celestial Reference Frame in the Southern Hemisphere, and subsequently enhance the International Terrestrial Reference Frame through the ability to detect and mitigate systematic error. This, combined with the simultaneous densification of the GNSS network across Australia, will enable the improved measurement of intraplate deformation across the Australian tectonic plate. In this paper, we present a description of this new infrastructure and present some initial results, including telescope performance measurements and positions of the telescopes in the International Terrestrial Reference Frame. We show that this array is already capable of achieving centimetre precision over typical long-baselines and that network and reference source systematic effects must be further improved to reach the ambitious goals of VLBI2010.

Water, sanitation and hygiene infrastructure and quality in rural healthcare facilities in Rwanda.

PubMed

Huttinger, Alexandra; Dreibelbis, Robert; Kayigamba, Felix; Ngabo, Fidel; Mfura, Leodomir; Merryweather, Brittney; Cardon, Amelie; Moe, Christine

2017-08-03

WHO and UNICEF have proposed an action plan to achieve universal water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) coverage in healthcare facilities (HCFs) by 2030. The WASH targets and indicators for HCFs include: an improved water source on the premises accessible to all users, basic sanitation facilities, a hand washing facility with soap and water at all sanitation facilities and patient care areas. To establish viable targets for WASH in HCFs, investigation beyond 'access' is needed to address the state of WASH infrastructure and service provision. Patient and caregiver use of WASH services is largely unaddressed in previous studies despite being critical for infection control. The state of WASH services used by staff, patients and caregivers was assessed in 17 rural HCFs in Rwanda. Site selection was non-random and predicated upon piped water and power supply. Direct observation and semi-structured interviews assessed drinking water treatment, presence and condition of sanitation facilities, provision of soap and water, and WASH-related maintenance and record keeping. Samples were collected from water sources and treated drinking water containers and analyzed for total coliforms, E. coli, and chlorine residual. Drinking water treatment was reported at 15 of 17 sites. Three of 18 drinking water samples collected met the WHO guideline for free chlorine residual of >0.2 mg/l, 6 of 16 drinking water samples analyzed for total coliforms met the WHO guideline of <1 coliform/100 mL and 15 of 16 drinking water samples analyzed for E. coli met the WHO guideline of <1 E. coli/100 mL. HCF staff reported treating up to 20 L of drinking water per day. At all sites, 60% of water access points (160 of 267) were observed to be functional, 32% of hand washing locations (46 of 142) had water and soap and 44% of sanitary facilities (48 of 109) were in hygienic condition and accessible to patients. Regular maintenance of WASH infrastructure consisted of cleaning; no HCF had on-site capacity for performing repairs. Quarterly evaluations of HCFs for Rwanda's Performance Based Financing system included WASH indicators. All HCFs met national policies for water access, but WHO guidelines for environmental standards including water quality were not fully satisfied. Access to WASH services at the HCFs differed between staff and patients and caregivers.

LSST summit facility construction progress report: reacting to design refinements and field conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barr, Jeffrey D.; Gressler, William; Sebag, Jacques; Seriche, Jaime; Serrano, Eduardo

2016-07-01

The civil work, site infrastructure and buildings for the summit facility of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) are among the first major elements that need to be designed, bid and constructed to support the subsequent integration of the dome, telescope, optics, camera and supporting systems. As the contracts for those other major subsystems now move forward under the management of the LSST Telescope and Site (T and S) team, there has been inevitable and beneficial evolution in their designs, which has resulted in significant modifications to the facility and infrastructure. The earliest design requirements for the LSST summit facility were first documented in 2005, its contracted full design was initiated in 2010, and construction began in January, 2015. During that entire development period, and extending now roughly halfway through construction, there continue to be necessary modifications to the facility design resulting from the refinement of interfaces to other major elements of the LSST project and now, during construction, due to unanticipated field conditions. Changes from evolving interfaces have principally involved the telescope mount, the dome and mirror handling/coating facilities which have included significant variations in mass, dimensions, heat loads and anchorage conditions. Modifications related to field conditions have included specifying and testing alternative methods of excavation and contending with the lack of competent rock substrate where it was predicted to be. While these and other necessary changes are somewhat specific to the LSST project and site, they also exemplify inherent challenges related to the typical timeline for the design and construction of astronomical observatory support facilities relative to the overall development of the project.

Stormwater Management for Federal Facilities under Section 438 of the Energy Independence and Security Act

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

Federal agencies are required to reduce stormwater runoff from federal development and redevelopment projects to protect water resources. Options include a variety of stormwater management practices like green infrastructure or low impact development

Controlling Infrastructure Costs: Right-Sizing the Mission Control Facility

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Martin, Keith; Sen-Roy, Michael; Heiman, Jennifer

2009-01-01

Johnson Space Center's Mission Control Center is a space vehicle, space program agnostic facility. The current operational design is essentially identical to the original facility architecture that was developed and deployed in the mid-90's. In an effort to streamline the support costs of the mission critical facility, the Mission Operations Division (MOD) of Johnson Space Center (JSC) has sponsored an exploratory project to evaluate and inject current state-of-the-practice Information Technology (IT) tools, processes and technology into legacy operations. The general push in the IT industry has been trending towards a data-centric computer infrastructure for the past several years. Organizations facing challenges with facility operations costs are turning to creative solutions combining hardware consolidation, virtualization and remote access to meet and exceed performance, security, and availability requirements. The Operations Technology Facility (OTF) organization at the Johnson Space Center has been chartered to build and evaluate a parallel Mission Control infrastructure, replacing the existing, thick-client distributed computing model and network architecture with a data center model utilizing virtualization to provide the MCC Infrastructure as a Service. The OTF will design a replacement architecture for the Mission Control Facility, leveraging hardware consolidation through the use of blade servers, increasing utilization rates for compute platforms through virtualization while expanding connectivity options through the deployment of secure remote access. The architecture demonstrates the maturity of the technologies generally available in industry today and the ability to successfully abstract the tightly coupled relationship between thick-client software and legacy hardware into a hardware agnostic "Infrastructure as a Service" capability that can scale to meet future requirements of new space programs and spacecraft. This paper discusses the benefits and difficulties that a migration to cloud-based computing philosophies has uncovered when compared to the legacy Mission Control Center architecture. The team consists of system and software engineers with extensive experience with the MCC infrastructure and software currently used to support the International Space Station (ISS) and Space Shuttle program (SSP).

Survey of Emergency and Essential Surgical, Obstetric and Anaesthetic Services Available in Bangladeshi Government Health Facilities.

PubMed

Loveday, Jonathan; Sachdev, Sonal P; Cherian, Meena N; Katayama, Francisco; Akhtaruzzaman, A K M; Thomas, Joe; Huda, N; Faragher, E Brian; Johnson, Walter D

2017-07-01

Evaluate the capacity of government-run hospitals in Bangladesh to provide emergency and essential surgical, obstetric and anaesthetic services. Cross-sectional survey of 240 Bangladeshi Government healthcare facilities using the World Health Organisation Situational Analysis Tool to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care (SAT). This tool evaluates the ability of a healthcare facility to provide basic surgical, obstetric and anaesthetic care based on 108 queries that detail the infrastructure and population demographics, human resources, surgical interventions and reason for referral, and available surgical equipment and supplies. For this survey, the Bangladeshi Ministry of Health sent the SAT to sub-district, district/general and teaching hospitals throughout the country in April 2013. Responses were received from 240 healthcare facilities (49.5% response rate): 218 sub-district and 22 district/general hospitals. At the sub-district level, caesarean section was offered by 55% of facilities, laparotomy by 7% and open fracture repair by 8%. At the district/general hospital level, 95% offered caesarean section, 86% offered laparotomy and 77% offered open fracture treatment. Availability of anaesthesia services, general equipment and supplies reflected this trend, where district/general hospitals were better equipped than sub-district hospitals, though equipment and infrastructure shortages persist. There has been overall impressive progress by the Bangladeshi Government in providing essential surgical services. Areas for improvement remain across all key areas, including infrastructure, human resources, surgical interventions offered and available equipment. Investment in surgical services offers a cost-effective opportunity to continue to improve the health of the Bangladeshi population and move the country towards universal healthcare coverage.

ICAT: Integrating data infrastructure for facilities based science

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Flannery, Damian; Matthews, Brian; Griffin, Tom

2009-12-21

ICAT: Integrating data infrastructure for facilities based science Damian Flannery, Brian Matthews, Tom Griffin, Juan Bicarregui, Michael Gleaves, Laurent Lerusse, Roger Downing, Alun Ashton, Shoaib Sufi, Glen Drinkwater, Kerstin Kleese Abstract— Scientific facilities, in particular large-scale photon and neutron sources, have demanding requirements to manage the increasing quantities of experimental data they generate in a systematic and secure way. In this paper, we describe the ICAT infrastructure for cataloguing facility generated experimental data which has been in development within STFC and DLS for several years. We consider the factors which have influenced its design and describe its architecture and metadatamore » model, a key tool in the management of data. We go on to give an outline of its current implementation and use, with plans for its future development.« less

A cross-sectional survey of essential surgical capacity in Somalia

PubMed Central

Elkheir, Natalie; Sharma, Akshay; Cherian, Meena; Saleh, Omar Abdelrahman; Everard, Marthe; Popal, Ghulam Rabani; Ibrahim, Abdi Awad

2014-01-01

Objective To assess life-saving and disability-preventing surgical services (including emergency, trauma, obstetrics, anaesthesia) of health facilities in Somalia and to assist in the planning of strategies for strengthening surgical care systems. Design Cross-sectional survey. Setting Health facilities in all 3 administrative zones of Somalia; northwest Somalia (NWS), known as Somaliland; northeast Somalia (NES), known as Puntland; and south/central Somalia (SCS). Participants 14 health facilities. Measures The WHO Tool for Situational Analysis to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care was employed to capture a health facility's capacity to deliver surgical and anaesthesia services by investigating four categories of data: infrastructure, human resources, interventions available and equipment. Results The 14 facilities surveyed in Somalia represent 10 of the 18 districts throughout the country. The facilities serve an average patient population of 331 250 people, and 12 of the 14 identify as hospitals. While major surgical procedures were provided at many facilities (caesarean section, laparotomy, appendicectomy, etc), only 22% had fully available oxygen access, 50% fully available electricity and less than 30% had any management guidelines for emergency and surgical care. Furthermore, only 36% were able to provide general anaesthesia inhalation due to lack of skills, supplies and equipment. Basic supplies for airway management and the prevention of infection transmission were severely lacking in most facilities. Conclusions According to the results of the WHO Tool for Situational Analysis to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care survey, there exist significant gaps in the capacity of emergency and essential surgical services in Somalia including inadequacies in essential equipment, service provision and infrastructure. The information provided by the WHO tool can serve as a basis for evidence-based decisions on country-level policy regarding the allocation of resources and provision of emergency and essential surgical services. PMID:24812189

A cross-sectional survey of essential surgical capacity in Somalia.

PubMed

Elkheir, Natalie; Sharma, Akshay; Cherian, Meena; Saleh, Omar Abdelrahman; Everard, Marthe; Popal, Ghulam Rabani; Ibrahim, Abdi Awad

2014-05-07

To assess life-saving and disability-preventing surgical services (including emergency, trauma, obstetrics, anaesthesia) of health facilities in Somalia and to assist in the planning of strategies for strengthening surgical care systems. Cross-sectional survey. Health facilities in all 3 administrative zones of Somalia; northwest Somalia (NWS), known as Somaliland; northeast Somalia (NES), known as Puntland; and south/central Somalia (SCS). 14 health facilities. The WHO Tool for Situational Analysis to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care was employed to capture a health facility's capacity to deliver surgical and anaesthesia services by investigating four categories of data: infrastructure, human resources, interventions available and equipment. The 14 facilities surveyed in Somalia represent 10 of the 18 districts throughout the country. The facilities serve an average patient population of 331 250 people, and 12 of the 14 identify as hospitals. While major surgical procedures were provided at many facilities (caesarean section, laparotomy, appendicectomy, etc), only 22% had fully available oxygen access, 50% fully available electricity and less than 30% had any management guidelines for emergency and surgical care. Furthermore, only 36% were able to provide general anaesthesia inhalation due to lack of skills, supplies and equipment. Basic supplies for airway management and the prevention of infection transmission were severely lacking in most facilities. According to the results of the WHO Tool for Situational Analysis to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care survey, there exist significant gaps in the capacity of emergency and essential surgical services in Somalia including inadequacies in essential equipment, service provision and infrastructure. The information provided by the WHO tool can serve as a basis for evidence-based decisions on country-level policy regarding the allocation of resources and provision of emergency and essential surgical services.

AMF3 ARM's Research Facility and MAOS at Oliktok Point Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Helsel, F.; Ivey, M.; Dexheimer, D.; Hardesty, J.; Lucero, D. A.; Roesler, E. L.

2016-12-01

Scientific Infrastructure To Support Atmospheric Science And Aerosol Science For The Department Of Energy's Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Programs Mobile Facility 3 Located At Oliktok Point, Alaska.The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program's Mobile Facility 3 (AMF3) located at Oliktok Point, Alaska is a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) site designed to collect data to determine the impact that clouds and aerosols have on solar radiation. The site provides a scientific infrastructure and data archives for the international Arctic research community. The infrastructure at Oliktok is designed to be mobile and it may be relocated in the future to support other ARM science missions. AMF3's present instruments include: scanning precipitation Radar-cloud radar, Raman Lidar, Eddy correlation flux systems, Ceilometer, Balloon sounding system, Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI), Micro-pulse Lidar (MPL), Millimeter cloud radar along with all the standard metrological measurements. A Mobile Aerosol Observing System (MAOS) has been added to AMF3 in 2016 more details of the instrumentation at www.arm.gov/sites/amf/mobile-aos. Data from these instruments are placed in the ARM data archives and are available to the international research community. This poster will discuss what instruments are at the ARM Program's AMF3 and highlight the newest addition to AMF3, the Mobile Aerosol Observing System (MAOS).

Liquid Rocket Engine Testing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rahman, Shamim

2005-01-01

Comprehensive Liquid Rocket Engine testing is essential to risk reduction for Space Flight. Test capability represents significant national investments in expertise and infrastructure. Historical experience underpins current test capabilities. Test facilities continually seek proactive alignment with national space development goals and objectives including government and commercial sectors.

Overview of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Neigut, J.

2015-01-01

In 2013, the Human Research Program at NASA began developing a new confinement analog specifically for conducting research to investigate the effects of confinement on the human system. The HERA (Human Exploration Research Analog) habitat has been used for both 7 and 14 day missions to date to examine and mitigate exploration risks to enable safe, reliable and productive human space exploration. This presentation will describe how the Flight Analogs Project developed the HERA facility and the infrastructure to suit investigator requirements for confinement research and in the process developed a new approach to analog utilization and a new state of the art analog facility. Details regarding HERA operations will be discussed including specifics on the mission simulation utilized for the current 14-day campaign, the specifics of the facility (total volume, overall size, hardware), and the capabilities available to researchers. The overall operational philosophy, mission fidelity including timeline, schedule pressures and cadence, and development and implementation of mission stressors will be presented. Research conducted to date in the HERA has addressed risks associated with behavioral health and performance, human physiology, as well as human factors. This presentation will conclude with a discussion of future research plans for the HERA, including infrastructure improvements and additional research capabilities planned for the upcoming 30-day missions in 2016.

Building Cyberinfrastructures for Earth and Space Sciences so that they will come: lessons learnt from Australia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wyborn, L. A.; Woodcock, R.

2013-12-01

One of the greatest drivers for change in the way scientific research is undertaken in Australia was the development of the Australian eResearch Infrastructure which was coordinated by the then Australian Government Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research. There were two main tranches of funding: the 2007-2013 National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) and the 2009 Education and Investment Framework (EIF) Super Science Initiative. Investments were in two areas: the Australian e-Research Infrastructure and domain specific capabilities: combined investment in both is 1,452M with at least 456M being invested in eResearch infrastructure. NCRIS was specifically designed as a community-guided process to provide researchers, both academic and government, with major research facilities, supporting infrastructures and networks necessary for world-class research. Extensive community engagement was sought to inform decisions on where Australia could best make strategic infrastructure investments to further develop its research capacity and improve research outcomes over the next 5 to 10years. The current (2007-2014) Australian e-Research Infrastructure has 2 components: 1. The National eResearch physical infrastructure which includes two petascale HPC facilities (one in Canberra and one in Perth), a 10 Gbps national network (National Research Network), a national data storage infrastructure comprising 8 multi petabyte data stores and shared access methods (Australian Access Federation). 2. A second component is focused on research integration infrastructures and includes the Australian National Data Service, which is concerned with better management, description and access to distributed research data in Australia and the National eResearch Collaboration Tools and Resources (NeCTAR) project. NeCTAR is centred on developing problem oriented digital laboratories which provide better and coordinated access to research tools, data environments and workflows. The eResearch Infrastructure Stack is designed to support 12 individual domain-specific capabilities. Four are relevant to the Earth and Space Sciences: (1) AuScope (a national Earth Science Infrastructure Program), (2) the Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS), (3) the Terrestrial Ecosystems Research Network (TERN) and (4) the Australian Urban Research Infrastructure Network (AURIN). The two main research integration infrastructures, ANDS and NeCTAR, are seen as pivotal to the success of the Australian eResearch Infrastructure. Without them, there was a risk that that the investments in new computers and data storage would provide physical infrastructure, but few would come to use it as the skills barriers to entry were too high. ANDS focused on transforming Australia's research data environment. Its flagship is Research Data Australia, an Internet-based discovery service designed to provide rich connections between data, projects, researchers and institutions, and promote visibility of Australian research data collections in search engines. NeCTAR focused on building eResearch infrastructure in four areas: virtual laboratories, tools, a federated research cloud and a hosting service. Combined, ANDS and NeCTAR are ensuring that people ARE coming and ARE using the physical infrastructures that were built.

Virtual Facility at Fermilab: Infrastructure and Services Expand to Public Clouds

DOE PAGES

Timm, Steve; Garzoglio, Gabriele; Cooper, Glenn; ...

2016-02-18

In preparation for its new Virtual Facility Project, Fermilab has launched a program of work to determine the requirements for running a computation facility on-site, in public clouds, or a combination of both. This program builds on the work we have done to successfully run experimental workflows of 1000-VM scale both on an on-site private cloud and on Amazon AWS. To do this at scale we deployed dynamically launched and discovered caching services on the cloud. We are now testing the deployment of more complicated services on Amazon AWS using native load balancing and auto scaling features they provide. Themore » Virtual Facility Project will design and develop a facility including infrastructure and services that can live on the site of Fermilab, off-site, or a combination of both. We expect to need this capacity to meet the peak computing requirements in the future. The Virtual Facility is intended to provision resources on the public cloud on behalf of the facility as a whole instead of having each experiment or Virtual Organization do it on their own. We will describe the policy aspects of a distributed Virtual Facility, the requirements, and plans to make a detailed comparison of the relative cost of the public and private clouds. Furthermore, this talk will present the details of the technical mechanisms we have developed to date, and the plans currently taking shape for a Virtual Facility at Fermilab.« less

Virtual Facility at Fermilab: Infrastructure and Services Expand to Public Clouds

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Timm, Steve; Garzoglio, Gabriele; Cooper, Glenn

In preparation for its new Virtual Facility Project, Fermilab has launched a program of work to determine the requirements for running a computation facility on-site, in public clouds, or a combination of both. This program builds on the work we have done to successfully run experimental workflows of 1000-VM scale both on an on-site private cloud and on Amazon AWS. To do this at scale we deployed dynamically launched and discovered caching services on the cloud. We are now testing the deployment of more complicated services on Amazon AWS using native load balancing and auto scaling features they provide. Themore » Virtual Facility Project will design and develop a facility including infrastructure and services that can live on the site of Fermilab, off-site, or a combination of both. We expect to need this capacity to meet the peak computing requirements in the future. The Virtual Facility is intended to provision resources on the public cloud on behalf of the facility as a whole instead of having each experiment or Virtual Organization do it on their own. We will describe the policy aspects of a distributed Virtual Facility, the requirements, and plans to make a detailed comparison of the relative cost of the public and private clouds. Furthermore, this talk will present the details of the technical mechanisms we have developed to date, and the plans currently taking shape for a Virtual Facility at Fermilab.« less

The European Network of Analytical and Experimental Laboratories for Geosciences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Freda, Carmela; Funiciello, Francesca; Meredith, Phil; Sagnotti, Leonardo; Scarlato, Piergiorgio; Troll, Valentin R.; Willingshofer, Ernst

2013-04-01

Integrating Earth Sciences infrastructures in Europe is the mission of the European Plate Observing System (EPOS).The integration of European analytical, experimental, and analogue laboratories plays a key role in this context and is the task of the EPOS Working Group 6 (WG6). Despite the presence in Europe of high performance infrastructures dedicated to geosciences, there is still limited collaboration in sharing facilities and best practices. The EPOS WG6 aims to overcome this limitation by pushing towards national and trans-national coordination, efficient use of current laboratory infrastructures, and future aggregation of facilities not yet included. This will be attained through the creation of common access and interoperability policies to foster and simplify personnel mobility. The EPOS ambition is to orchestrate European laboratory infrastructures with diverse, complementary tasks and competences into a single, but geographically distributed, infrastructure for rock physics, palaeomagnetism, analytical and experimental petrology and volcanology, and tectonic modeling. The WG6 is presently organizing its thematic core services within the EPOS distributed research infrastructure with the goal of joining the other EPOS communities (geologists, seismologists, volcanologists, etc...) and stakeholders (engineers, risk managers and other geosciences investigators) to: 1) develop tools and services to enhance visitor programs that will mutually benefit visitors and hosts (transnational access); 2) improve support and training activities to make facilities equally accessible to students, young researchers, and experienced users (training and dissemination); 3) collaborate in sharing technological and scientific know-how (transfer of knowledge); 4) optimize interoperability of distributed instrumentation by standardizing data collection, archive, and quality control standards (data preservation and interoperability); 5) implement a unified e-Infrastructure for data analysis, numerical modelling, and joint development and standardization of numerical tools (e-science implementation); 6) collect and store data in a flexible inventory database accessible within and beyond the Earth Sciences community(open access and outreach); 7) connect to environmental and hazard protection agencies, stakeholders, and public to raise consciousness of geo-hazards and geo-resources (innovation for society). We will inform scientists and industrial stakeholders on the most recent WG6 achievements in EPOS and we will show how our community is proceeding to design the thematic core services.

Methodology to Estimate the Quantity, Composition, and ...

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

This report, Methodology to Estimate the Quantity, Composition and Management of Construction and Demolition Debris in the US, was developed to expand access to data on CDD in the US and to support research on CDD and sustainable materials management. Since past US EPA CDD estimates have been limited to building-related CDD, a goal in the development of this methodology was to use data originating from CDD facilities and contractors to better capture the current picture of total CDD management, including materials from roads, bridges and infrastructure. This report, Methodology to Estimate the Quantity, Composition and Management of Construction and Demolition Debris in the US, was developed to expand access to data on CDD in the US and to support research on CDD and sustainable materials management. Since past US EPA CDD estimates have been limited to building-related CDD, a goal in the development of this methodology was to use data originating from CDD facilities and contractors to better capture the current picture of total CDD management, including materials from roads, bridges and infrastructure.

a System Dynamics Model to Study the Importance of Infrastructure Facilities on Quality of Primary Education System in Developing Countries

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pedamallu, Chandra Sekhar; Ozdamar, Linet; Weber, Gerhard-Wilhelm; Kropat, Erik

2010-06-01

The system dynamics approach is a holistic way of solving problems in real-time scenarios. This is a powerful methodology and computer simulation modeling technique for framing, analyzing, and discussing complex issues and problems. System dynamics modeling and simulation is often the background of a systemic thinking approach and has become a management and organizational development paradigm. This paper proposes a system dynamics approach for study the importance of infrastructure facilities on quality of primary education system in developing nations. The model is proposed to be built using the Cross Impact Analysis (CIA) method of relating entities and attributes relevant to the primary education system in any given community. We offer a survey to build the cross-impact correlation matrix and, hence, to better understand the primary education system and importance of infrastructural facilities on quality of primary education. The resulting model enables us to predict the effects of infrastructural facilities on the access of primary education by the community. This may support policy makers to take more effective actions in campaigns.

Integrated Facilities and Infrastructure Plan.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Reisz Westlund, Jennifer Jill

Our facilities and infrastructure are a key element of our capability-based science and engineering foundation. The focus of the Integrated Facilities and Infrastructure Plan is the development and implementation of a comprehensive plan to sustain the capabilities necessary to meet national research, design, and fabrication needs for Sandia National Laboratories’ (Sandia’s) comprehensive national security missions both now and into the future. A number of Sandia’s facilities have reached the end of their useful lives and many others are not suitable for today’s mission needs. Due to the continued aging and surge in utilization of Sandia’s facilities, deferred maintenance has continuedmore » to increase. As part of our planning focus, Sandia is committed to halting the growth of deferred maintenance across its sites through demolition, replacement, and dedicated funding to reduce the backlog of maintenance needs. Sandia will become more agile in adapting existing space and changing how space is utilized in response to the changing requirements. This Integrated Facilities & Infrastructure (F&I) Plan supports the Sandia Strategic Plan’s strategic objectives, specifically Strategic Objective 2: Strengthen our Laboratories’ foundation to maximize mission impact, and Strategic Objective 3: Advance an exceptional work environment that enables and inspires our people in service to our nation. The Integrated F&I Plan is developed through a planning process model to understand the F&I needs, analyze solution options, plan the actions and funding, and then execute projects.« less

Manned Mars System Study (MMSS): Mars transportation and facility study. Volume 1: Executive Summary

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1990-01-01

The purpose of the study was to design and analyze systems for conducting human missions to Mars and the moon, with special emphasis on the transportation and facility infrastructure. This study was conducted by Martin Marietta Astronautics Group, with an important teaming role by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). This work included the studies and separate reports of the FY-1988 and 1989 case studies as well as special analyses and parametric studies.

SWEIS annual review - CY2002 : a comparison of CY2002 operations to projections included in the site-wide environmental impact statement for continued operation of Sandia National Laboratories/New Mexico.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bayliss, Linda Sue; White, Brenda Bailey; Guerrero, Joseph Vincent

2003-10-01

The SNL/NM CY2002 SWEIS Annual Review discusses changes in facilities and facility operations that have occurred in selected and notable facilities since source data were collected for the SNL/NM SWEIS (DOE/EIS-0281). The following information is presented: {sm_bullet} An updated overview of SNL/NM selected and notable facilities and infrastructure capabilities. {sm_bullet} An overview of SNL/NM environment, safety, and health programs, including summaries of the purpose, operations, activities, hazards, and hazard controls at relevant facilities and risk management methods for SNL/NM. {sm_bullet} Updated base year activities data, together with related inventories, material consumption, emissions, waste, and resource consumption. {sm_bullet} Appendices summarizing activitiesmore » and related hazards at SNL/NM individual special, general, and highbay laboratories, and chemical purchases.« less

Australia's TERN: Building, Sustaining and Advancing Collaborative Long Term Ecosystem Research Networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

HEld, A. A.; Phinn, S. R.

2012-12-01

TERN is Australia's Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (www.tern.org.au) is one of several environmental data collection, storage and sharing projects developed through the government's research infrastructure programs 2008-2014. This includes terrestrial and coastal ecosystem data collection infrastructure across multiple disciplines, hardware, software and processes used to store, analyse and integrate data sets. TERN's overall objective is to build the collaborations, infrastructure and programs to meet the needs of ecosystem science communities in Australia in the long term, through institutional frameworks necessary to establish a national terrestrial ecosystem site and observational network, coordinated networks enabling cooperation and operational experience; public access to quality assured and appropriately licensed data; and allowing the terrestrial ecosystem research community to define and sustain the terrestrial observing paradigm into the longer term. This paper explains how TERN was originally established, and now operates, along with plans to sustain itself in the future. TERN is implemented through discipline/technical groups referred to as "TERN Facilities". Combined, the facilities provide observations of surface mass and energy fluxes over key ecosystems, biophysical remote sensing data, ecological survey plots, soils information, and coastal ecosystems and associated water quality variables across Australia. Additional integrative facilities cover elements of ecoinformatics, data-scaling and modelling, and linking science to management. A central coordination and portal facility provides meta-data storage, data identification, legal and licensing support. Data access, uploading, meta-data generation, DOI attachment and licensing is completed at each facility's own portal level. TERN also acts as the open-data repository of choice for Australian scientists required to publish their data. Several key lessons we have learnt, will be presented during the talk.

Energy Systems Fabrication Laboratory | Energy Systems Integration Facility

Science.gov Websites

Fabrication The fuel cell fabrication hub includes laboratory spaces with local exhaust and chemical fume hoods that support electrolysis and other chemical process research. Key Infrastructure Perchloric acid washdown hood, local exhaust, specialty gas manifolding, deionized water, chemical fume hoods, glassware

49 CFR 268.1 - Definitions.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... environmental impact statement which is required pursuant to §§ 268.3. Eligible project costs means the costs of preconstruction planning activities and the capital cost of the fixed guideway infrastructure of a Maglev project... storage, repair, and maintenance facilities, but eligible project costs do not include the cost of...

Nuclear Energy Infrastructure Database Fitness and Suitability Review

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Heidrich, Brenden

In 2014, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Science and Technology Innovation (NE-4) initiated the Nuclear Energy-Infrastructure Management Project by tasking the Nuclear Science User Facilities (NSUF) to create a searchable and interactive database of all pertinent NE supported or related infrastructure. This database will be used for analyses to establish needs, redundancies, efficiencies, distributions, etc. in order to best understand the utility of NE’s infrastructure and inform the content of the infrastructure calls. The NSUF developed the database by utilizing data and policy direction from a wide variety of reports from the Department of Energy, the National Research Council, themore » International Atomic Energy Agency and various other federal and civilian resources. The NEID contains data on 802 R&D instruments housed in 377 facilities at 84 institutions in the US and abroad. A Database Review Panel (DRP) was formed to review and provide advice on the development, implementation and utilization of the NEID. The panel is comprised of five members with expertise in nuclear energy-associated research. It was intended that they represent the major constituencies associated with nuclear energy research: academia, industry, research reactor, national laboratory, and Department of Energy program management. The Nuclear Energy Infrastructure Database Review Panel concludes that the NSUF has succeeded in creating a capability and infrastructure database that identifies and documents the major nuclear energy research and development capabilities across the DOE complex. The effort to maintain and expand the database will be ongoing. Detailed information on many facilities must be gathered from associated institutions added to complete the database. The data must be validated and kept current to capture facility and instrumentation status as well as to cover new acquisitions and retirements.« less

Commercial space infrastructure - Giving industry a lift

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stone, Barbara A.; Wood, Peter W.

1991-01-01

Private sector initiatives directed toward establishing a commercial space sector in the fields of commercial space transportation, payload processing, upper stages, launch facilities, and other facilities and equipment are presented. Consideration is given to a payload processing facility that is capable of providing all prelaunch services required by communications satellites targeted for launch on U.S. launch systems. Attention is given to NASA's efforts to promote commercial infrastructure development for the creation of new products and services, leading to new markets and businesses.

Eco-logical : an ecosystem approach to developing transportation infrastructure projects in a changing environment

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-09-13

The development of infrastructure facilities can negatively impact critical habitat and essential ecosystems. There are a variety of techniques available to avoid, minimize, and mitigate negative impacts of existing infrastructure as well as future i...

Next Generation Monitoring: Tier 2 Experience

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fay, R.; Bland, J.; Jones, S.

2017-10-01

Monitoring IT infrastructure is essential for maximizing availability and minimizing disruption by detecting failures and developing issues. The HEP group at Liverpool have recently updated our monitoring infrastructure with the goal of increasing coverage, improving visualization capabilities, and streamlining configuration and maintenance. Here we present a summary of Liverpool’s experience, the monitoring infrastructure, and the tools used to build it. In brief, system checks are configured in Puppet using Hiera, and managed by Sensu, replacing Nagios. Centralised logging is managed with Elasticsearch, together with Logstash and Filebeat. Kibana provides an interface for interactive analysis, including visualization and dashboards. Metric collection is also configured in Puppet, managed by collectd and stored in Graphite, with Grafana providing a visualization and dashboard tool. The Uchiwa dashboard for Sensu provides a web interface for viewing infrastructure status. Alert capabilities are provided via external handlers. A custom alert handler is in development to provide an easily configurable, extensible and maintainable alert facility.

Mapping Disparities in Access to Safe, Timely, and Essential Surgical Care in Zambia.

PubMed

Esquivel, Micaela M; Uribe-Leitz, Tarsicio; Makasa, Emmanuel; Lishimpi, Kennedy; Mwaba, Peter; Bowman, Kendra; Weiser, Thomas G

2016-11-01

Surgical care is widely unavailable in developing countries; advocates recommend that countries evaluate and report on access to surgical care to improve availability and aid health planners in decision making. To analyze the infrastructure, capacity, and availability of surgical care in Zambia to inform health policy priorities. In this observational study, all hospitals providing surgical care were identified in cooperation with the Zambian Ministry of Health. On-site data collection was conducted from February 1 through August 30, 2011, with an adapted World Health Organization Global Initiative for Emergency and Essential Surgical Care survey. Data collection at each facility included interviews with hospital personnel and assessment of material resources. Data were geocoded and analyzed in a data visualization platform from March 1 to December 1, 2015. We analyzed time and distance to surgical services, as well as the proportion of the population living within 2 hours from a facility providing surgical care. Surgical capacity, supplies, human resources, and infrastructure at each surgical facility, as well as the population living within 2 hours from a hospital providing surgical care. Data were collected from all 103 surgical facilities identified as providing surgical care. When including all surgical facilities (regardless of human resources and supplies), 14.9% of the population (2 166 460 of 14 500 000 people) lived more than 2 hours from surgical care. However, only 17 hospitals (16.5%) met the World Health Organization minimum standards of surgical safety; when limiting the analysis to these hospitals, 65.9% of the population (9 552 780 people) lived in an area that was more than 2 hours from a surgical facility. Geographic analysis of emergency and essential surgical care, defined as access to trauma care, obstetric care, and care of common abdominal emergencies, found that 80.7% of the population (11 704 700 people) lived in an area that was more than 2 hours from these surgical facilities. A large proportion of the population in Zambia does not have access to safe and timely surgical care; this percentage would change substantially if all surgical hospitals were adequately resourced. Geospatial visualization tools assist in the evaluation of surgical infrastructure in Zambia and can identify key areas for improvement.

Teacher Perceptions of the Use of a Public-Private Partnership for School Facility Provision

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bradley-Levine, Jill

2008-01-01

This article considers how the private finance initiative, a contract for infrastructure, affected teachers' perceptions of efficacy, job satisfaction, and morale at an urban secondary school in the United Kingdom. Qualitative data collection techniques, including unstructured observation and semistructured personal interviews, were utilized to…

Some Contracting Controls at Mission and Installation Contracting Command, Fort Polk, Louisiana, Need Improvement

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-02-12

erosion control. Work that did not meet PWS requirements included laying pavement stones for a monument walkway and installing a glossy marble -like... property structures, roads, training areas, training facilities, and utility infrastructure. The contract period of performance consisted of a base year

Outdoor Testing Areas | Energy Systems Integration Facility | NREL

Science.gov Websites

of engineers running tests on plug-in hybrid electric vehicles at the Medium-Voltage Outdoor Test large microgrids hub, located in the outdoor low-voltage test yard, includes underground trench access pits for full enclosure of rotating machinery under test. Key Infrastructure Secured underground pits

Flooding and intestinal illness due to Clostridium difficile infection: a case-crossover analysis of Massachusetts data, 2003-2007

EPA Science Inventory

Background. Climate change has contributed to a rise in extreme weather events, including heavier rainfalls. Floods can cause water bodies to overflow, damage water treatment and drinking water infrastructure, overwhelm sewage treatment facilities, and result in discharges of un...

The Walls Still Speak: The Stories Occupants Tell

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Uline, Cynthia L.; Tschannen-Moran, Megan; Wolsey, Thomas DeVere

2009-01-01

Purpose: Accompanying the recent concern for the quality of our nation's educational infrastructure, a growing body of research connects the quality of school facilities to both student outcomes including achievement, behavior, and attitude as well as to teacher attitude and behavior. Less is known about the mechanisms of these relationships. This…

Exchange of Veterans Affairs medical data using national and local networks.

PubMed

Dayhoff, R E; Maloney, D L

1992-12-17

Remote data exchange is extremely useful to a number of medical applications. It requires an infrastructure including systems, network and software tools. With such an infrastructure, existing local applications can be extended to serve national needs. There are many approaches to providing remote data exchange. Selection of an approach for an application requires balancing of various factors, including the need for rapid interactive access to data and ad hoc queries, the adequacy of access to predefined data sets, the need for an integrated view of the data, the ability to provide adequate security protection, the amount of data required, and the time frame in which data is required. The applications described here demonstrate new ways that the VA is reaping benefits from its infrastructure and its compatible integrated hospital information systems located at its facilities. The needs that have been met are also needs of private hospitals. However, in many cases the infrastructure to allow data exchange is not present. The VA's experiences may serve to establish the benefits that can be obtained by all hospitals.

Service provider perspectives on post-abortion contraception in Nepal.

PubMed

Wang, Lin-Fan; Puri, Mahesh; Rocca, Corinne H; Blum, Maya; Henderson, Jillian T

2016-01-01

The government of Nepal has articulated a commitment to the provision of post-abortion contraception since the implementation of a legal safe abortion policy in 2004. Despite this, gaps in services remain. This study examined the perspectives of abortion service providers and administrators regarding strengths and shortcomings of post-abortion contraceptive service provision. In-depth interviews were conducted with 24 abortion providers and administrators at four major health facilities that provide legal abortion in Nepal. Facility factors perceived to impact post-abortion contraceptive services included on-site availability of contraceptive supplies, dedicated and well-trained staff and adequate infrastructure. Cultural norms emerged as influencing contraceptive demand by patients, including method use being unacceptable for women whose husbands migrate and limited decision-making power among women. Service providers described their personal views on appropriate childbearing and the use of specific contraceptive methods that influenced counselling. Findings suggest that improvements to a facility's infrastructure and training to address provider biases and misinformation may improve post-abortion family planning uptake. Adapting services to be sensitive to cultural expectations and norms may help address some barriers to contraceptive use. More research is needed to determine how to best meet the contraceptive needs of women who have infrequent sexual activity or who may face stigma for using family planning, including adolescents, unmarried women and women whose husbands migrate.

Does quality influence utilization of primary health care? Evidence from Haiti.

PubMed

Gage, Anna D; Leslie, Hannah H; Bitton, Asaf; Jerome, J Gregory; Joseph, Jean Paul; Thermidor, Roody; Kruk, Margaret E

2018-06-20

Expanding coverage of primary healthcare services such as antenatal care and vaccinations is a global health priority; however, many Haitians do not utilize these services. One reason may be that the population avoids low quality health facilities. We examined how facility infrastructure and the quality of primary health care service delivery were associated with community utilization of primary health care services in Haiti. We constructed two composite measures of quality for all Haitian facilities using the 2013 Service Provision Assessment survey. We geographically linked population clusters from the Demographic and Health Surveys to nearby facilities offering primary health care services. We assessed the cross-sectional association between quality and utilization of four primary care services: antenatal care, postnatal care, vaccinations and sick child care, as well as one more complex service: facility delivery. Facilities performed poorly on both measures of quality, scoring 0.55 and 0.58 out of 1 on infrastructure and service delivery quality respectively. In rural areas, utilization of several primary cares services (antenatal care, postnatal care, and vaccination) was associated with both infrastructure and quality of service delivery, with stronger associations for service delivery. Facility delivery was associated with infrastructure quality, and there was no association for sick child care. In urban areas, care utilization was not associated with either quality measure. Poor quality of care may deter utilization of beneficial primary health care services in rural areas of Haiti. Improving health service quality may offer an opportunity not only to improve health outcomes for patients, but also to expand coverage of key primary health care services.

Study on the availability of physical infrastructure and manpower facilities in sub-centers of Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh.

PubMed

Reddy, N Bayapa; Prabhu, G Ravi; Sai, T S R

2012-01-01

The sub-centers (SCs) are under constant criticism for their inability to deliver quality services due to the nonavailability of adequate infrastructure, manpower and supply of drugs.A cross-sectional study was conducted in Chittoor District of Andhra Pradesh to assess the availability of physical infrastructure and manpower in the SCs. A total of 34 SCs were selected by multistage and stratified random sampling technique. The data was statistically analyzed by using Microsoft Excel. The deficiency in the availability of health workers male and female were found to be 67.7% and 27.5%, respectively. The residential facility for health workers was available only in 26.4% SCs. Only 20.6% of SCs had stethoscope and B.P apparatus. The physical infrastructure and manpower availability at the SCs needs considerable improvement as per the Indian Public Health Standard (IPHS). Facilities to conduct the normal delivery and 24-hours emergency referral services need to be addressed at the earliest.

Institutional Transformation Model

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

2015-10-19

Reducing the energy consumption of large institutions with dozens to hundreds of existing buildings while maintaining and improving existing infrastructure is a critical economic and environmental challenge. SNL's Institutional Transformation (IX) work integrates facilities and infrastructure sustainability technology capabilities and collaborative decision support modeling approaches to help facilities managers at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) simulate different future energy reduction strategies and meet long term energy conservation goals.

Arctic Atmospheric Measurements Using Manned and Unmanned Aircraft, Tethered Balloons, and Ground-Based Systems at U.S. DOE ARM Facilities on the North Slope Of Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ivey, M.; Dexheimer, D.; Roesler, E. L.; Hillman, B. R.; Hardesty, J. O.

2016-12-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) provides scientific infrastructure and data to the international Arctic research community via research sites located on the North Slope of Alaska and an open data archive maintained by the ARM program. In 2016, DOE continued investments in improvements to facilities and infrastructure at Oliktok Point Alaska to support operations of ground-based facilities and unmanned aerial systems for science missions in the Arctic. The Third ARM Mobile Facility, AMF3, now deployed at Oliktok Point, was further expanded in 2016. Tethered instrumented balloons were used at Oliktok to make measurements of clouds in the boundary layer including mixed-phase clouds and to compare measurements with those from the ground and from unmanned aircraft operating in the airspace above AMF3. The ARM facility at Oliktok Point includes Special Use Airspace. A Restricted Area, R-2204, is located at Oliktok Point. Roughly 4 miles in diameter, it facilitates operations of tethered balloons and unmanned aircraft. R-2204 and a new Warning Area north of Oliktok, W-220, are managed by Sandia National Laboratories for DOE Office of Science/BER. These Special Use Airspaces have been successfully used to launch and operate unmanned aircraft over the Arctic Ocean and in international airspace north of Oliktok Point.A steady progression towards routine operations of unmanned aircraft and tethered balloon systems continues at Oliktok. Small unmanned aircraft (DataHawks) and tethered balloons were successfully flown at Oliktok starting in June of 2016. This poster will discuss how principal investigators may apply for use of these Special Use Airspaces, acquire data from the Third ARM Mobile Facility, or bring their own instrumentation for deployment at Oliktok Point, Alaska.

Situational analysis of services for diabetes and diabetic retinopathy and evaluation of programs for the detection and treatment of diabetic retinopathy in India: Methods for the India 11-city 9-state study.

PubMed

Murthy, G V S; Gilbert, Clare E; Shukla, Rajan; Vashist, Praveen; Shamanna, B R

2016-04-01

Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is a leading cause of visual impairment in India. Available evidence shows that there are more than 60 million persons with diabetes in India and that the number will increase to more than a 100 million by 2030. There is a paucity of data on the perceptions and practices of persons with diabetes and the available infrastructure and uptake of services for DR in India. Assess perception of care and challenges faced in availing eye care services among persons with diabetics and generate evidence on available human resources, infrastructure, and service utilization for DR in India. The cross-sectional, hospital-based survey was conducted in eleven cities across 9 States in India. In each city, public and private providers of eye-care were identified. Both multispecialty and standalone facilities were included. Specially designed semi-open ended questionnaires were administered to the clients. Semi-structured interviews were administered to the service providers (both diabetic care physicians and eye care teams) and observational checklists were used to record findings of the assessment of facilities conducted by a dedicated team of research staff. A total of 859 units were included in this study. This included 86 eye care and 73 diabetic care facilities, 376 persons with diabetes interviewed in the eye clinics and 288 persons with diabetes interviewed in the diabetic care facilities. The findings will have significant implications for the organization of services for persons with diabetes in India.

Survey of the capacity for essential surgery and anaesthesia services in Papua New Guinea

PubMed Central

Martin, Janet; Tau, Goa; Cherian, Meena Nathan; Vergel de Dios, Jennifer; Mills, David; Fitzpatrick, Jane; Adu-Krow, William; Cheng, Davy

2015-01-01

Objective To assess capacity to provide essential surgical services including emergency, obstetric and anaesthesia care in Papua New Guinea (PNG) in order to support planning for relevant post-2015 sustainable development goals for PNG. Design Cross-sectional survey. Setting Hospitals and health facilities in PNG. Participants 21 facilities including 3 national/provincial hospitals, 11 district/rural hospitals, and 7 health centres. Outcome measures The WHO Situational Analysis Tool to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care (WHO-SAT) was used to measure each participating facility's capacity to deliver essential surgery and anaesthesia services, including 108 items related to relevant infrastructure, human resources, interventions and equipment. Results While major surgical procedures were provided at each hospital, fewer than 30% had uninterrupted access to oxygen, and 57% had uninterrupted access to resuscitation bag and mask. Most hospitals reported capacity to provide general anaesthesia, though few hospitals reported having at least one certified surgeon, obstetrician and anaesthesiologist. Access to anaesthetic machines, pulse oximetry and blood bank was severely limited. Many non-hospital health centres providing basic surgical procedures, but almost none had uninterrupted access to electricity, running water, oxygen and basic supplies for resuscitation, airway management and obstetric services. Conclusions Capacity for essential surgery and anaesthesia services is severely limited in PNG due to shortfalls in physical infrastructure, human resources, and basic equipment and supplies. Achieving post-2015 sustainable development goals, including universal healthcare, will require significant investment in surgery and anaesthesia capacity in PNG. PMID:26674504

Principles of Emergency Department facility design for optimal management of mass-casualty incidents.

PubMed

Halpern, Pinchas; Goldberg, Scott A; Keng, Jimmy G; Koenig, Kristi L

2012-04-01

The Emergency Department (ED) is the triage, stabilization and disposition unit of the hospital during a mass-casualty incident (MCI). With most EDs already functioning at or over capacity, efficient management of an MCI requires optimization of all ED components. While the operational aspects of MCI management have been well described, the architectural/structural principles have not. Further, there are limited reports of the testing of ED design components in actual MCI events. The objective of this study is to outline the important infrastructural design components for optimization of ED response to an MCI, as developed, implemented, and repeatedly tested in one urban medical center. In the authors' experience, the most important aspects of ED design for MCI have included external infrastructure and promoting rapid lockdown of the facility for security purposes; an ambulance bay permitting efficient vehicle flow and casualty discharge; strategic placement of the triage location; patient tracking techniques; planning adequate surge capacity for both patients and staff; sufficient command, control, communications, computers, and information; well-positioned and functional decontamination facilities; adequate, well-located and easily distributed medical supplies; and appropriately built and functioning essential services. Designing the ED to cope well with a large casualty surge during a disaster is not easy, and it may not be feasible for all EDs to implement all the necessary components. However, many of the components of an appropriate infrastructural design add minimal cost to the normal expenditures of building an ED. This study highlights the role of design and infrastructure in MCI preparedness in order to assist planners in improving their ED capabilities. Structural optimization calls for a paradigm shift in the concept of structural and operational ED design, but may be necessary in order to maximize surge capacity, department resilience, and patient and staff safety.

Emergency, anaesthetic and essential surgical capacity in the Gambia

PubMed Central

Shivute, Nestor; Bickler, Stephen; Cole-Ceesay, Ramou; Jargo, Bakary; Abdullah, Fizan; Cherian, Meena

2011-01-01

Abstract Objective To assess the resources for essential and emergency surgical care in the Gambia. Methods The World Health Organization’s Tool for Situation Analysis to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care was distributed to health-care managers in facilities throughout the country. The survey was completed by 65 health facilities – one tertiary referral hospital, 7 district/general hospitals, 46 health centres and 11 private health facilities – and included 110 questions divided into four sections: (i) infrastructure, type of facility, population served and material resources; (ii) human resources; (iii) management of emergency and other surgical interventions; (iv) emergency equipment and supplies for resuscitation. Questionnaire data were complemented by interviews with health facility staff, Ministry of Health officials and representatives of nongovernmental organizations. Findings Important deficits were identified in infrastructure, human resources, availability of essential supplies and ability to perform trauma, obstetric and general surgical procedures. Of the 18 facilities expected to perform surgical procedures, 50.0% had interruptions in water supply and 55.6% in electricity. Only 38.9% of facilities had a surgeon and only 16.7% had a physician anaesthetist. All facilities had limited ability to perform basic trauma and general surgical procedures. Of public facilities, 54.5% could not perform laparotomy and 58.3% could not repair a hernia. Only 25.0% of them could manage an open fracture and 41.7% could perform an emergency procedure for an obstructed airway. Conclusion The present survey of health-care facilities in the Gambia suggests that major gaps exist in the physical and human resources needed to carry out basic life-saving surgical interventions. PMID:21836755

Electrical Resistivity Imaging Below Nuclear Waste Tank Farms at the Hanford Site

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rucker, D. F.; Levitt, M. T.

2006-12-01

The Hanford Site, a Department of Energy nuclear processing facility in eastern Washington, contains a complex series of radiological liquid waste disposal and storage facilities. The primary method of interim storage is the use of large single-shelled steel tanks with capacities of up to 3790 m3 (1 million gallons). The tanks are organized below ground into tank farms, with about 12 tanks per farm. The liquid waste within the tanks is primarily comprised of inorganic salts with minor constituents of heavy metals and radiological metals. The electrical properties of the radiological waste are significantly different to that of the surrounding engineered fill and native geologic formations. Over the past 60 years since the earliest tanks have been in use, many have been known to leak. An electrical resistivity survey was conducted within a tank farm to map the extent of the plumes resulting from historic leaks. Traditional surface-based electrical resistivity surveys resulted in unusable data due to the significant subsurface infrastructure that included a network of delivery pipes, wells, fences, and electrical discharge sources . HGI adapted the resistivity technique to include the site infrastructure as transceivers to augment data density and geometry. The results show a distribution of low resistivity values within the farm in areas that match known historic leak sites. The addition of site infrastructure as sensors demonstrates that the electrical resistivity technique can be used in highly industrial sites.

EU H2020 SERA: Seismology and Earthquake Engineering Research Infrastructure Alliance for Europe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Giardini, Domenico; Saleh, Kauzar; SERA Consortium, the

2017-04-01

SERA - Seismology and Earthquake Engineering Research Infrastructure Alliance for Europe - is a new infrastructure project awarded in the last Horizon 2020 call for Integrating Activities for Advanced Communities (INFRAIA-01-2016-2017). Building up on precursor projects like NERA, SHARE, NERIES, SERIES, etc., SERA is expected to contribute significantly to the access of data, services and research infrastructures, and to develop innovative solutions in seismology and earthquake engineering, with the overall objective of reducing the exposure to risks associated to natural and anthropogenic earthquakes. For instance, SERA will revise the European Seismic Hazard reference model for input in the current revision of the Eurocode 8 on Seismic Design of Buildings; we also foresee to develop the first comprehensive framework for seismic risk modeling at European scale, and to develop new standards for future experimental observations and instruments for earthquake engineering and seismology. To that aim, SERA is engaging 31 institutions across Europe with leading expertise in the operation of research facilities, monitoring infrastructures, data repositories and experimental facilities in the fields of seismology, anthropogenic hazards and earthquake engineering. SERA comprises 26 activities, including 5 Networking Activities (NA) to improve the availability and access of data through enhanced community coordination and pooling of resources, 6 Joint Research Activities (JRA) aimed at creating new European standards for the optimal use of the data collected by the European infrastructures, Virtual Access (VA) to the 5 main European services for seismology and engineering seismology, and Trans-national Access (TA) to 10 high-class experimental facilities for earthquake engineering and seismology in Europe. In fact, around 50% of the SERA resources will be dedicated to virtual and transnational access. SERA and EPOS (European Platform Observing System, a European Research Infrastructure Consortium for solid Earth services in Europe) will be developed in parallel, giving SERA the capacity to develop building blocks for EPOS in the areas of seismology, anthropogenic hazards and seismic engineering, such as new virtual access, new anthropogenic hazards products, expanded access to waveform data, etc. In addition, services developed and validated in SERA will be produced in a way that is compatible for integration in EPOS. This communication is aimed at informing the scientific community about the objectives and workplan of SERA, starting in spring 2017 for a duration of 3 years.

7 CFR 3575.25 - Ineligible loan purposes.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... over tenants and services offered except for industrial-site infrastructure development, (b) Facilities... facilities, (d) Telephone systems, (e) Facilities which are not modest in size, design, and cost, (f) Finder...

Spaceport aurora: An orbiting transportation node

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1990-01-01

With recent announcements of the development of permanently staffed facilities on the Moon and Mars, the national space plan is in need of an infrastructure system for transportation and maintenance. A project team at the University of Houston College of Architecture and the Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture, recently examined components for a low Earth orbit (LEO) transportation node that supports a lunar build-up scenario. Areas of investigation included identifying transportation node functions, identifying existing space systems and subsystems, analyzing variable orbits, determining logistics strategies for maintenance, and investigating assured crew return systems. The information resulted in a requirements definition document, from which the team then addressed conceptual designs for a LEO transportation node. The primary design drivers included: orbital stability, maximizing human performance and safety, vehicle maintainability, and modularity within existing space infrastructure. For orbital stability, the power tower configuration provides a gravity gradient stabilized facility and serves as the backbone for the various facility components. To maximize human performance, human comfort is stressed through zoning of living and working activities, maintaining a consistent local vertical orientation, providing crew interaction and viewing areas and providing crew return vehicles. Vehicle maintainability is accomplished through dual hangars, dual work cupolas, work modules, telerobotics and a fuel depot. Modularity is incorporated using Space Station Freedom module diameter, Space Station Freedom standard racks, and interchangeable interior partitions. It is intended that the final design be flexible and adaptable to provide a facility prototype that can service multiple mission profiles using modular space systems.

Aerocapture, Entry, Descent and Landing (AEDL) Human Planetary Landing Systems. Section 10: AEDL Analysis, Test and Validation Infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Arnold, J.; Cheatwood, N.; Powell, D.; Wolf, A.; Guensey, C.; Rivellini, T.; Venkatapathy, E.; Beard, T.; Beutter, B.; Laub, B.

2005-01-01

Contents include the following: 3 Listing of critical capabilities (knowledge, procedures, training, facilities) and metrics for validating that they are mission ready. Examples of critical capabilities and validation metrics: ground test and simulations. Flight testing to prove capabilities are mission ready. Issues and recommendations.

44 CFR 201.7 - Tribal Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... of existing and future buildings, infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified... effects of each hazard, with particular emphasis on new and existing buildings and infrastructure. (iii...

Efficiency improvement of the investment and innovation activities in the transport facility construction field with public-private partnership involvement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shibayeva, Marina; Serebryakova, Yelena; Shalnev, Oleg

2017-10-01

Growing demand to increase the investment volume in modernization and development projects for transport infrastructure define the urgency of the current study. The amount of private sector investments in the field is insufficient to implement the projects for road construction due to their significant capital intensity and long payoff period. The implementation of social significant infrastructure projects on the principles of public-private partnership is one of the key strategic directions of growth for transport facilities. The authors come up with a concept and methodology for modeling the investment and innovation activity in the transport facility construction. Furthermore, there is developed a model to find the balance between public and private sector investments in implementing construction projects for transport infrastructure with involvement of PPP (further - public-private partnership). The suggested concepts aim to improve the efficiency rate of the investment and innovation activity in the field of transport facility construction on the basis of public and private sectors collaboration.

Integration of research infrastructures and ecosystem models toward development of predictive ecology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Luo, Y.; Huang, Y.; Jiang, J.; MA, S.; Saruta, V.; Liang, G.; Hanson, P. J.; Ricciuto, D. M.; Milcu, A.; Roy, J.

2017-12-01

The past two decades have witnessed rapid development in sensor technology. Built upon the sensor development, large research infrastructure facilities, such as National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) and FLUXNET, have been established. Through networking different kinds of sensors and other data collections at many locations all over the world, those facilities generate large volumes of ecological data every day. The big data from those facilities offer an unprecedented opportunity for advancing our understanding of ecological processes, educating teachers and students, supporting decision-making, and testing ecological theory. The big data from the major research infrastructure facilities also provides foundation for developing predictive ecology. Indeed, the capability to predict future changes in our living environment and natural resources is critical to decision making in a world where the past is no longer a clear guide to the future. We are living in a period marked by rapid climate change, profound alteration of biogeochemical cycles, unsustainable depletion of natural resources, and deterioration of air and water quality. Projecting changes in future ecosystem services to the society becomes essential not only for science but also for policy making. We will use this panel format to outline major opportunities and challenges in integrating research infrastructure and ecosystem models toward developing predictive ecology. Meanwhile, we will also show results from an interactive model-experiment System - Ecological Platform for Assimilating Data into models (EcoPAD) - that have been implemented at the Spruce and Peatland Responses Under Climatic and Environmental change (SPRUCE) experiment in Northern Minnesota and Montpellier Ecotron, France. EcoPAD is developed by integrating web technology, eco-informatics, data assimilation techniques, and ecosystem modeling. EcoPAD is designed to streamline data transfer seamlessly from research infrastructure facilities to model simulation, data assimilation, and ecological forecasting.

Quantifying surgical and anesthetic availability at primary health facilities in Mongolia.

PubMed

Spiegel, David A; Choo, Shelly; Cherian, Meena; Orgoi, Sergelen; Kehrer, Beat; Price, Raymond R; Govind, Salik

2011-02-01

Significant barriers limit the safe and timely provision of surgical and anaesthetic care in low- and middle-income countries. Nearly one-half of Mongolia's population resides in rural areas where the austere geography makes travel for adequate surgical care very difficult. Our goal was to characterize the availability of surgical and anaesthetic services, in terms of infrastructure capability, physical resources (supplies and equipment), and human resources for health at primary level health facilities in Mongolia. A situational analysis of the capacity to deliver emergency and essential surgical care (EESC) was performed in a nonrandom sample of 44 primary health facilities throughout Mongolia. Significant shortfalls were noted in the capacity to deliver surgical and anesthetic services. Deficiencies in infrastructure and supplies were common, and there were no trained surgeons or anaesthesiologists at any of the health facilities sampled. Most procedures were performed by general doctors and paraprofessionals, and occasionally visiting surgeons from higher levels of the health system. While basic interventions such as suturing or abscess drainage were commonly performed, the availability of many essential interventions was absent at a significant number of facilities. This situational analysis of the availability of essential surgical and anesthetic services identified significant deficiencies in infrastructure, supplies, and equipment, as well as a lack of human resources at the primary referral level facilities in Mongolia. Given the significant travel distances to secondary level facilities for the majority of the rural population, there is an urgent need to strengthen the delivery of essential surgical and anaesthetic services at the primary referral level (soum and intersoum). This will require a multidisciplinary, multi-sectoral effort aimed to improve infrastructure, procure and maintain essential equipment and supplies, and train appropriate health professionals.

A Multidisciplinary Research Framework on Green Schools: Infrastructure, Social Environment, Occupant Health, and Performance.

PubMed

Magzamen, Sheryl; Mayer, Adam P; Barr, Stephanie; Bohren, Lenora; Dunbar, Brian; Manning, Dale; Reynolds, Stephen J; Schaeffer, Joshua W; Suter, Jordan; Cross, Jennifer E

2017-05-01

Sustainable school buildings hold much promise to reducing operating costs, improve occupant well-being and, ultimately, teacher and student performance. However, there is a scarcity of evidence on the effects of sustainable school buildings on health and performance indicators. We sought to create a framework for a multidisciplinary research agenda that links school facilities, health, and educational outcomes. We conducted a nonsystematic review of peer review publications, government documents, organizational documents, and school climate measurement instruments. We found that studies on the impact of physical environmental factors (air, lighting, and thermal comfort) on health and occupant performance are largely independent of research on the social climate. The current literature precludes the formation of understanding the causal relation among school facilities, social climate, occupant health, and occupant performance. Given the average age of current school facilities in the United States, construction of new school facilities or retrofits of older facilities will be a major infrastructure investment for many municipalities over the next several decades. Multidisciplinary research that seeks to understand the impact of sustainable design on the health and performance of occupants will need to include both an environmental science and social science perspective to inform best practices and quantification of benefits that go beyond general measures of costs savings from energy efficiencies. © 2017, American School Health Association.

Optimal condition sampling of infrastructure networks.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-10-15

Transportation infrastructure systems consist of spatially extensive and longlived sets of interconnected : facilities. Over the past two decades, several new nondestructive inspection technologies have been : developed and applied in collectin...

Facility and Laboratory Equipment | Energy Systems Integration Facility |

Science.gov Websites

Energy Systems Integration Facility is its infrastructure. In addition to extensive fixed laboratory . Photo of researchers testing building loads and power networks in the Systems Performance Laboratory

Progress and Challenges in Developing Reference Data Layers for Human Population Distribution and Built Infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, R. S.; Yetman, G.; de Sherbinin, A. M.

2015-12-01

Understanding the interactions between environmental and human systems, and in particular supporting the applications of Earth science data and knowledge in place-based decision making, requires systematic assessment of the distribution and dynamics of human population and the built human infrastructure in conjunction with environmental variability and change. The NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC) operated by the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) at Columbia University has had a long track record in developing reference data layers for human population and settlements and is expanding its efforts on topics such as intercity roads, reservoirs and dams, and energy infrastructure. SEDAC has set as a strategic priority the acquisition, development, and dissemination of data resources derived from remote sensing and socioeconomic data on urban land use change, including temporally and spatially disaggregated data on urban change and rates of change, the built infrastructure, and critical facilities. We report here on a range of past and ongoing activities, including the Global Human Settlements Layer effort led by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC), the Global Exposure Database for the Global Earthquake Model (GED4GEM) project, the Global Roads Open Access Data Working Group (gROADS) of the Committee on Data for Science and Technology (CODATA), and recent work with ImageCat, Inc. to improve estimates of the exposure and fragility of buildings, road and rail infrastructure, and other facilities with respect to selected natural hazards. New efforts such as the proposed Global Human Settlement indicators initiative of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) could help fill critical gaps and link potential reference data layers with user needs. We highlight key sectors and themes that require further attention, and the many significant challenges that remain in developing comprehensive, high quality, up-to-date, and well maintained reference data layers on population and built infrastructure. The need for improved indicators of sustainable development in the context of the post-2015 development framework provides an opportunity to link data efforts directly with international development needs and investments.

44 CFR 201.7 - Tribal Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... buildings, infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified hazard areas; (B) An estimate... particular emphasis on new and existing buildings and infrastructure. (iii) An action plan describing how the...

Army Corrosion Prevention and Control (CPC) Program for Facilities and Infrastructure

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-02-01

FY2009 - 2011 • Benefits: Reduced corrosion due to elimination of metallic rebar , reduced weight equates to reduced dead load and increased dynamic...Decks as Replacement for Steel Reinforced Concrete Decks F09AR04: Corrosion Resistant Roofs with Integrated Sustainable PV Power Systems • Where...Army Corrosion Prevention and Control (CPC) Program for Facilities and Infrastructure Dr. Craig E. College Deputy Assistant Chief of Staff for

Infrastructure and Private Sector Investment in Pakistan

DTIC Science & Technology

1997-03-01

manner in which the expansion in various types of infrastructural facilities interact with private sector investment, and whether there is a long run...passive role in the country’s development. That is public facilities have largely expanded in response to the needs created by private sector investment...tangible needs created by private sector expansion it has, no doubt, been very effective in alleviating real bottlenecks. (JEL F21, 053).

33 CFR 105.205 - Facility Security Officer (FSO).

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... training in the following, as appropriate: (i) Relevant international laws and codes, and recommendations... well as any plans to change the facility or facility infrastructure prior to amending the FSP; and (18...

Controlling Methane Emissions in the Natural Gas Sector. A Review of Federal and State Regulatory Frameworks Governing Production, Gathering, Processing, Transmission, and Distribution

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Paranhos, Elizabeth; Kozak, Tracy G.; Boyd, William

This report provides an overview of the regulatory frameworks governing natural gas supply chain infrastructure siting, construction, operation, and maintenance. Information was drawn from a number of sources, including published analyses, government reports, in addition to relevant statutes, court decisions and regulatory language, as needed. The scope includes all onshore facilities that contribute to methane emissions from the natural gas sector, focusing on three areas of state and federal regulations: (1) natural gas pipeline infrastructure siting and transportation service (including gathering, transmission, and distribution pipelines), (2) natural gas pipeline safety, and (3) air emissions associated with the natural gas supplymore » chain. In addition, the report identifies the incentives under current regulatory frameworks to invest in measures to reduce leakage, as well as the barriers facing investment in infrastructure improvement to reduce leakage. Policy recommendations regarding how federal or state authorities could regulate methane emissions are not provided; rather, existing frameworks are identified and some of the options for modifying existing regulations or adopting new regulations to reduce methane leakage are discussed.« less

Availability of Youth Services in U.S. Mental Health Treatment Facilities

PubMed Central

Cummings, Janet R.; Case, Brady G.; Ji, Xu; Marcus, Steven C.

2015-01-01

Despite concern about access to mental health (MH) services for youth, little is known about the specialty treatment infrastructure serving this population. We used national data to examine which types of MH treatment facilities (hospital- and community-based) were most likely to offer youth services and which types of communities were most likely to have this infrastructure. Larger (p<0.001) and privately owned (p<0.001) facilities were more likely to offer youth services. Rural counties, counties in which a majority of residents were nonwhite, and/or counties with a higher percentage of uninsured residents were less likely to have a community-based MH treatment facility that served youth (p<0.001). PMID:26467795

44 CFR 201.6 - Local Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

..., infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified hazard areas; (B) An estimate of the potential... effects of each hazard, with particular emphasis on new and existing buildings and infrastructure. All...

44 CFR 201.6 - Local Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

..., infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified hazard areas; (B) An estimate of the potential... effects of each hazard, with particular emphasis on new and existing buildings and infrastructure. All...

44 CFR 201.6 - Local Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

..., infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified hazard areas; (B) An estimate of the potential... effects of each hazard, with particular emphasis on new and existing buildings and infrastructure. All...

University of Maryland MRSEC - Facilities: Instrumentation Infrastructure

Science.gov Websites

Instrumentation Infrastructure In order to establish a broader campus context, each MRSEC Shared Experimental without alteration is granted to educational institutions for non-profit administrative or educational

The CAT-ACT Beamline at ANKA: A new high energy X-ray spectroscopy facility for CATalysis and ACTinide research

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zimina, A.; Dardenne, K.; Denecke, M. A.; Grunwaldt, J. D.; Huttel, E.; Lichtenberg, H.; Mangold, S.; Pruessmann, T.; Rothe, J.; Steininger, R.; Vitova, T.

2016-05-01

A new hard X-ray beamline for CATalysis and ACTinide research has been built at the synchrotron radiation facility ANKA. The beamline design is dedicated to X-ray spectroscopy, including ‘flux hungry’ photon-in/photon-out and correlative techniques with a special infrastructure for radionuclide and catalysis research. The CAT-ACT beamline will help serve the growing need for high flux/hard X-ray spectroscopy in these communities. The design, the first spectra and the current status of this project are reported.

DOE/DHS INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM CYBER SECURITY PROGRAMS: A MODEL FOR USE IN NUCLEAR FACILITY SAFEGUARDS AND SECURITY

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robert S. Anderson; Mark Schanfein; Trond Bjornard

2011-07-01

Many critical infrastructure sectors have been investigating cyber security issues for several years especially with the help of two primary government programs. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National SCADA Test Bed and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Control Systems Security Program have both implemented activities aimed at securing the industrial control systems that operate the North American electric grid along with several other critical infrastructure sectors (ICS). These programs have spent the last seven years working with industry including asset owners, educational institutions, standards and regulating bodies, and control system vendors. The programs common mission is tomore » provide outreach, identification of cyber vulnerabilities to ICS and mitigation strategies to enhance security postures. The success of these programs indicates that a similar approach can be successfully translated into other sectors including nuclear operations, safeguards, and security. The industry regulating bodies have included cyber security requirements and in some cases, have incorporated sets of standards with penalties for non-compliance such as the North American Electric Reliability Corporation Critical Infrastructure Protection standards. These DOE and DHS programs that address security improvements by both suppliers and end users provide an excellent model for nuclear facility personnel concerned with safeguards and security cyber vulnerabilities and countermeasures. It is not a stretch to imagine complete surreptitious collapse of protection against the removal of nuclear material or even initiation of a criticality event as witnessed at Three Mile Island or Chernobyl in a nuclear ICS inadequately protected against the cyber threat.« less

Saving America's School Infrastructure. Research in Education Fiscal Policy and Practice.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crampton, Faith E., Ed.; Thompson, David C., Ed.

This book addresses funding for school facilities. Contents of section 1, "Overview and Scope of the Problem," are: (1) "Unmet School Infrastructure Funding Need as a Critical Educational Capacity Issue: Setting the Context" (Faith E. Crampton); (2) "Financing School Infrastructure Needs: An Overview across the 50 States" (Catherine C. Sielke);…

NREL Serves as the Energy Department's Showcase for Cutting-Edge Fuel Cell

Science.gov Websites

vehicle on loan from Hyundai through a one-year Cooperative Research and Development Agreement and a B produced at the Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility (HITRF) located at NREL's Energy and infrastructure as part of the Energy Department's Hydrogen Fueling Infrastructure Research and

Capacity analysis of pedestrian facilities involving individuals with disabilities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-08-31

Walking facilities are important infrastructures that must be designed to accommodate the behavior of pedestrians in order to be effective. Heterogeneity in pedestrian composition is one important factor generally overlooked in walking facility desig...

Survey of the capacity for essential surgery and anaesthesia services in Papua New Guinea.

PubMed

Martin, Janet; Tau, Goa; Cherian, Meena Nathan; Vergel de Dios, Jennifer; Mills, David; Fitzpatrick, Jane; Adu-Krow, William; Cheng, Davy

2015-12-16

To assess capacity to provide essential surgical services including emergency, obstetric and anaesthesia care in Papua New Guinea (PNG) in order to support planning for relevant post-2015 sustainable development goals for PNG. Cross-sectional survey. Hospitals and health facilities in PNG. 21 facilities including 3 national/provincial hospitals, 11 district/rural hospitals, and 7 health centres. The WHO Situational Analysis Tool to Assess Emergency and Essential Surgical Care (WHO-SAT) was used to measure each participating facility's capacity to deliver essential surgery and anaesthesia services, including 108 items related to relevant infrastructure, human resources, interventions and equipment. While major surgical procedures were provided at each hospital, fewer than 30% had uninterrupted access to oxygen, and 57% had uninterrupted access to resuscitation bag and mask. Most hospitals reported capacity to provide general anaesthesia, though few hospitals reported having at least one certified surgeon, obstetrician and anaesthesiologist. Access to anaesthetic machines, pulse oximetry and blood bank was severely limited. Many non-hospital health centres providing basic surgical procedures, but almost none had uninterrupted access to electricity, running water, oxygen and basic supplies for resuscitation, airway management and obstetric services. Capacity for essential surgery and anaesthesia services is severely limited in PNG due to shortfalls in physical infrastructure, human resources, and basic equipment and supplies. Achieving post-2015 sustainable development goals, including universal healthcare, will require significant investment in surgery and anaesthesia capacity in PNG. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/

Hydrogen Infrastructure Testing and Research Facility Animation (Text

Science.gov Websites

. Medium pressure hydrogen is stored in tanks and then fed to the high pressure compressor. High pressure hydrogen is stored in tanks and then fed to either high pressure research projects in ESIF or to the the high pressure compressor. The medium pressure storage photo gallery includes two photos of medium

Juvenile Justice and Students with Disabilities: State Infrastructure and Initiatives. inForum

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Muller, Eve

2006-01-01

According to data collected in 2003 by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), just over 96,000 youth were incarcerated in juvenile correctional facilities throughout the United States (not including those being held in detention). An additional 10,000 youth were in state prisons or adult jails during the same time,…

Doctrinal Guidelines for Quantitative Vulnerability Assessments of Infrastructure-Related Risks. Volume I

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-12-01

Services; Nuclear Reactors, Materials, and Waste; Information Technology; Communications ; Postal and Shipping; Transportation Systems; and Government...Materials, and Waste; Information Technology; Communications ; Postal and Shipping; Transportation Systems; and Government Facilities). 4 National...recommendations for best practices, including outreach and communications ; and e) Recommend how DHS can improve its risk analyses and how those analyses can

Assessment of Surgical and Trauma Capacity in Potosí, Bolivia.

PubMed

Blair, Kevin J; Boeck, Marissa A; Gallardo Barrientos, José Luis; Hidalgo López, José Luis; Helenowski, Irene B; Nwomeh, Benedict C; Shapiro, Michael B; Swaroop, Mamta

Scaling up surgical and trauma care in low- and middle-income countries could prevent nearly 2 million annual deaths. Various survey instruments exist to measure surgical and trauma capacity, including Personnel, Infrastructure, Procedures, Equipment, and Supplies (PIPES) and International Assessment of Capacity for Trauma (INTACT). We sought to evaluate surgical and trauma capacity in the Bolivian department of Potosí using a combined PIPES and INTACT tool, with additional questions to further inform intervention targets. In June and July 2014 a combined PIPES and INTACT survey was administered to 20 government facilities in Potosí with a minimum of 1 operating room: 2 third-level, 10 second-level, and 8 first-level facilities. A surgeon, head physician, director, or obstetrician-gynecologist completed the survey. Additional personnel responded to 4 short-answer questions. Survey items were divided into subsections, and PIPES and INTACT indices calculated. Medians were compared via Wilcoxon rank sum and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Six of 20 facilities were located in the capital city and designated urban. Urban establishments had higher median PIPES (8.5 vs 6.7, P = .11) and INTACT (8.5 vs 6.9, P = .16) indices compared with rural. More than half of surgeons and anesthesiologists worked in urban hospitals. Urban facilities had higher median infrastructure and procedure scores compared with rural. Fifty-three individuals completed short-answer questions. Training was most desired in laparoscopic surgery and trauma management; less than half of establishments reported staff with trauma training. Surgical and trauma capacity in Potosí was most limited in personnel, infrastructure, and procedures at rural facilities, with greater personnel deficiencies than previously reported. Interventions should focus on increasing the number of surgical and anesthesia personnel in rural areas, with a particular focus on the reported desire for trauma management training. Results have been made available to key stakeholders in Potosí to inform targeted quality improvement interventions. Copyright © 2017 Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Commerce lab: Mission analysis and payload integration study

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1984-01-01

Conceived as one or more arrays of carriers which would fly aboard space shuttle, Commerce Lab can provide a point of focus for implementing a series of shuttle flights, co-sponsored by NASA and U.S. domestic concerns, for performing materials processing in research and pre-commercial investigations. As an orbiting facility for testing, developing, and implementing hardware and procedures, Commerce Lab can enhance space station development and hasten space platform production capability. Tasks considered include: (1) synthesis of user requirements and identification of common element and voids; (2) definition of performance and infrastructure requirement and alternative approaches; and (3) carrier, mission model, and infrastructure development.

Technology requirements for an orbiting fuel depot - A necessary element of a space infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stubbs, R. M.; Corban, R. R.; Willoughby, A. J.

1988-01-01

Advanced planning within NASA has identified several bold space exploration initiatives. The successful implementation of these missions will require a supporting space infrastructure which would include a fuel depot, an orbiting facility to store, transfer and process large quantities of cryogenic fluids. In order to adequately plan the technology development programs required to enable the construction and operation of a fuel depot, a multidisciplinary workshop was convened to assess critical technologies and their state of maturity. Since technology requirements depend strongly on the depot design assumptions, several depot concepts are presented with their effect of criticality ratings. Over 70 depot-related technology areas are addressed.

Technology requirements for an orbiting fuel depot: A necessary element of a space infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stubbs, R. M.; Corban, R. R.; Willoughby, A. J.

1988-01-01

Advanced planning within NASA has identified several bold space exploration initiatives. The successful implementation of these missions will require a supporting space infrastructure which would include a fuel depot, an orbiting facility to store, transfer and process large quantities of cryogenic fluids. In order to adequately plan the technology development programs required to enable the construction and operation of a fuel depot, a multidisciplinary workshop was convened to assess critical technologies and their state of maturity. Since technology requirements depend strongly on the depot design assumptions, several depot concepts are presented with their effect on criticality ratings. Over 70 depot-related technology areas are addressed.

Facility Accounting: Hammering Out a Capital Replacement Budget.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Readinger, Jay

1996-01-01

Most facility and finance managers cannot adequately handle school infrastructure issues because they lack the tools to describe the problem appropriately. Facility accounting gives managers accurate deferral and projected replacement costs, using nationally recognized life-cycle and cost data. Facility accounting enables proper management of…

Thoughts on Beijing's Long-Term Rural Infrastructure Management and Protection Issues from the Perspective of the Government to Effectively Perform Their Duties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Z.

To strengthen rural infrastructure management, give full play to the role of benefit of infrastructure, it has important significance for promoting the development of rural economy and society. Protection-use and facility energy-use issues are outstanding during Beijing rural infrastructure management. The comprehensive and detailed analysis of the cause of the problems put forward the concrete feasible countermeasures from the government to fulfill the effective function to rural infrastructure: A clear property ownership; Implementation of special funds audit system of the rural infrastructure management; Implementation of rural infrastructure maintenance and management assessment methods and so on.

NFFA-Europe: enhancing European competitiveness in nanoscience research and innovation (Conference Presentation)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carsughi, Flavio; Fonseca, Luis

2017-06-01

NFFA-EUROPE is an European open access resource for experimental and theoretical nanoscience and sets out a platform to carry out comprehensive projects for multidisciplinary research at the nanoscale extending from synthesis to nanocharacterization to theory and numerical simulation. Advanced infrastructures specialized on growth, nano-lithography, nano-characterization, theory and simulation and fine-analysis with Synchrotron, FEL and Neutron radiation sources are integrated in a multi-site combination to develop frontier research on methods for reproducible nanoscience research and to enable European and international researchers from diverse disciplines to carry out advanced proposals impacting science and innovation. NFFA-EUROPE will enable coordinated access to infrastructures on different aspects of nanoscience research that is not currently available at single specialized ones and without duplicating their specific scopes. Approved user projects will have access to the best suited instruments and support competences for performing the research, including access to analytical large scale facilities, theory and simulation and high-performance computing facilities. Access is offered free of charge to European users and users will receive a financial contribution for their travel, accommodation and subsistence costs. The users access will include several "installations" and will be coordinated through a single entry point portal that will activate an advanced user-infrastructure dialogue to build up a personalized access programme with an increasing return on science and innovation production. The own research activity of NFFA-EUROPE will address key bottlenecks of nanoscience research: nanostructure traceability, protocol reproducibility, in-operando nano-manipulation and analysis, open data.

Energy Systems Integration Facility (ESIF): Golden, CO - Energy Integration

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sheppy, Michael; VanGeet, Otto; Pless, Shanti

2015-03-01

At NREL's Energy Systems Integration Facility (ESIF) in Golden, Colo., scientists and engineers work to overcome challenges related to how the nation generates, delivers and uses energy by modernizing the interplay between energy sources, infrastructure, and data. Test facilities include a megawatt-scale ac electric grid, photovoltaic simulators and a load bank. Additionally, a high performance computing data center (HPCDC) is dedicated to advancing renewable energy and energy efficient technologies. A key design strategy is to use waste heat from the HPCDC to heat parts of the building. The ESIF boasts an annual EUI of 168.3 kBtu/ft2. This article describes themore » building's procurement, design and first year of performance.« less

Welcome to NNIN | National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network

Science.gov Websites

ALD system located at the Stanford Nanofabrication Facility, one of the 14 NNIN nodes. NNIN facilities facilities such as this CVD furnace at the Cornell facility. Student using one of the scanning electron microscopes at the Howard University NNIN facility. This is one of over 1100 major instruments available

Advancing Translational Research through Facility Design in Non-AMC Hospitals.

PubMed

Pati, Debajyoti; Pietrzak, Michael P; Harvey, Thomas E; Armstrong, Walter B; Clarke, Robert; Weissman, Neil J; Rapp, Paul E; Smith, Mark S; Fairbanks, Rollin J; Collins, Jeffreyg M

2013-01-01

This article aims to explore the future of translational research and its physical design implications for community hospitals and hospitals not attached to large centralized research platforms. With a shift in medical services delivery focus to community wellness, continuum of care, and comparative effectiveness research, healthcare research will witness increasing pressure to include community-based practitioners. The roundtable discussion group, comprising 14 invited experts from 10 institutions representing the fields of biomedical research, research administration, facility planning and design, facility management, finance, and environmental design research, examined the issue in a structured manner. The discussion was conducted at the Washington Hospital Center, MedStar Health, Washington, D.C. Institutions outside the AMCs will be increasingly targeted for future research. Three factors are crucial for successful research in non-AMC hospitals: operational culture, financial culture, and information culture. An operating culture geared towards creation, preservation, and protection of spaces needed for research; creative management of spaces for financial accountability; and a flexible information infrastructure at the system level that enables complete link of key programmatic areas to academic IT research infrastructure are critical to success of research endeavors. Hospital, interdisciplinary, leadership, planning, work environment.

Power Systems Integration Laboratory | Energy Systems Integration Facility

Science.gov Websites

inverters. Key Infrastructure Grid simulator, load bank, Opal-RT, battery, inverter mounting racks, data , frequency-watt, and grid anomaly ride-through. Key Infrastructure House power, Opal-RT, PV simulator access

75 FR 60093 - Record of Decision for the United States Marine Corps Basewide Utilities Infrastructure Project...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-09-29

... construction, operation, and maintenance of utility infrastructure upgrades, expansions, and improvements... and wastewater facilities and road improvements to Range 130. All practical means to avoid or minimize...

Optimal condition sampling for a network of infrastructure facilities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-12-31

In response to the developments in inspection technologies, infrastructure decision-making methods evolved whereby the optimum combination of inspection decisions on the one hand and maintenance and rehabilitation decisions on the other are determine...

75 FR 18850 - National Protection and Programs Directorate; Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-04-13

... Programs Directorate (NPPD), Office of Infrastructure Protection (IP), Infrastructure Security Compliance... submitted by mail to the DHS/NPPD/ IP/ISCD CFATS Program Manager at the Department of Homeland Security, 245...

Availability of Youth Services in U.S. Mental Health Treatment Facilities.

PubMed

Cummings, Janet R; Case, Brady G; Ji, Xu; Marcus, Steven C

2016-09-01

Despite concern about access to mental health (MH) services for youth, little is known about the specialty treatment infrastructure serving this population. We used national data to examine which types of MH treatment facilities (hospital- and community-based) were most likely to offer youth services and which types of communities were most likely to have this infrastructure. Larger (p < 0.001) and privately owned (p < 0.001) facilities were more likely to offer youth services. Rural counties, counties in which a majority of residents were nonwhite, and/or counties with a higher percentage of uninsured residents were less likely to have a community-based MH treatment facility that served youth (p < 0.001).

Cryogenic Design of the New High Field Magnet Test Facility at CERN

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Benda, V.; Pirotte, O.; De Rijk, G.; Bajko, M.; Craen, A. Vande; Perret, Ph.; Hanzelka, P.

In the framework of the R&D program related to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) upgrades, a new High Field Magnet (HFM) vertical test bench is required. This facility located in the SM18 cryogenic test hall shall allow testing of up to 15 tons superconducting magnets with energy up to 10 MJ in a temperature range between 1.9 K and 4.5 K. The article describes the cryogenic architecture to be inserted in the general infrastructure of SM18 including the process and instrumentation diagram, the different operating phases including strategy for magnet cool down and warm up at controlled speed and quench management as well as the design of the main components.

Applications of multi-spectral imaging: failsafe industrial flame detector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wing Au, Kwong; Larsen, Christopher; Cole, Barry; Venkatesha, Sharath

2016-05-01

Industrial and petrochemical facilities present unique challenges for fire protection and safety. Typical scenarios include detection of an unintended fire in a scene, wherein the scene also includes a flare stack in the background. Maintaining a high level of process and plant safety is a critical concern. In this paper, we present a failsafe industrial flame detector which has significant performance benefits compared to current flame detectors. The design involves use of microbolometer in the MWIR and LWIR spectrum and a dual band filter. This novel flame detector can help industrial facilities to meet their plant safety and critical infrastructure protection requirements while ensuring operational and business readiness at project start-up.

The Fair Facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nilsson, Thomas

2015-03-01

The FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Beams), under construction at the GSI site in Darmstadt, Germany, will be addressing a wealth of outstanding questions within the realm of subatomic, atomic and plasma physics through a combination of novel accelerators, storage rings and innovative experimental setups. The envisaged programme of FAIR yields a breadth that is unprecedented at an accelerator-based infrastructure. A brief review of the FAIR infrastructure and scientific reach is made, together with an update of the status of the construction.

Telecommunications administration standard

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gustwiller, K.D.

1996-05-01

The administration of telecommunications is critical to proper maintenance and operation. The intent is to be able to properly support telecommunications for the distribution of all information within a building/campus. This standard will provide a uniform administration scheme that is independent of applications, and will establish guidelines for owners, installers, designers and contractors. This standard will accommodate existing building wiring, new building wiring and outside plant wiring. Existing buildings may not readily adapt to all applications of this standard, but the requirement for telecommunications administration is applicable to all buildings. Administration of the telecommunications infrastructure includes documentation (labels, records, drawings,more » reports, and work orders) of cables, termination hardware, patching and cross-connect facilities, telecommunications rooms, and other telecommunications spaces (conduits, grounding, and cable pathways are documented by Facilities Engineering). The investment in properly documenting telecommunications is a worthwhile effort. It is necessary to adhere to these standards to ensure quality and efficiency for the operation and maintenance of the telecommunications infrastructure for Sandia National Laboratories.« less

Health care network communications infrastructure: an engineering design for the Military Health Service System.

PubMed

Hoffman, P; Kline, E; George, L; Price, K; Clark, M; Walasin, R

1995-01-01

The Military Health Service System (MHSS) provides health care for the Department of Defense (DOD). This system operates on an annual budget of $15 Billion, supports 127 medical treatment facilities (MTFs) and 500 clinics, and provides support to 8.7 million beneficiaries worldwide. To support these facilities and their patients, the MHSS uses more than 125 different networked automated medical systems. These systems rely on a heterogeneous telecommunications infrastructure for data communications. With the support of the Defense Medical Information Management (DMIM) Program Office, our goal was to identify the network requirements for DMIM migration and target systems and design a communications infrastructure to support all systems with an integrated network. This work used tools from Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and applied it to communications infrastructure design for the first time. The methodology and results are applicable to any health care enterprise, military or civilian.

Health care network communications infrastructure: an engineering design for the Military Health Service System.

PubMed Central

Hoffman, P.; Kline, E.; George, L.; Price, K.; Clark, M.; Walasin, R.

1995-01-01

The Military Health Service System (MHSS) provides health care for the Department of Defense (DOD). This system operates on an annual budget of $15 Billion, supports 127 medical treatment facilities (MTFs) and 500 clinics, and provides support to 8.7 million beneficiaries worldwide. To support these facilities and their patients, the MHSS uses more than 125 different networked automated medical systems. These systems rely on a heterogeneous telecommunications infrastructure for data communications. With the support of the Defense Medical Information Management (DMIM) Program Office, our goal was to identify the network requirements for DMIM migration and target systems and design a communications infrastructure to support all systems with an integrated network. This work used tools from Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and applied it to communications infrastructure design for the first time. The methodology and results are applicable to any health care enterprise, military or civilian. PMID:8563346

Spatial modelling of disaster resilience using infrastructure components of baseline resilience indicators for communities (BRIC) in special region of Yogyakarta

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kuscahyadi, Febriana; Meilano, Irwan; Riqqi, Akhmad

2017-07-01

Special Region of Yogyakarta Province (DIY) is one of Indonesian regions that often harmed by varied natural disasters which caused huge negative impacts. The most catastrophic one is earthquake in May, 27th 2006 with 6.3 magnitude moment [1], evoked 5716 people died, and economic losses for Rp. 29.1 Trillion, [2]. Their impacts could be minimized by committing disaster risk reduction program. Therefore, it is necessary to measure the natural disaster resilience within a region. Since infrastructure are might be able as facilities that means for evacuations, distribute supplies, and post disaster recovery [3], this research concerns to establish spatial modelling of natural disaster resilience using infrastructure components based on BRIC in DIY Province. There are three infrastructure used in this model; they are school, health facilities, and roads. Distance analysis is used to determine the level of resilient zone. The result gives the spatial understanding as a map that urban areas have better disaster resilience than the rural areas. The coastal areas and mountains areas which are vulnerable towards disaster have less resilience since there are no enough facilities that will increase the disaster resilience

Unpacking the enabling factors for hand, cord and birth-surface hygiene in Zanzibar maternity units

PubMed Central

Gon, Giorgia; Ali, Said M; Towriss, Catriona; Kahabuka, Catherine; Ali, Ali O; Cavill, Sue; Dahoma, Mohammed; Faulkner, Sally; Haji, Haji S; Kabole, Ibrahim; Morrison, Emma; Said, Rukaiya M; Tajo, Amour; Velleman, Yael; Woodd, Susannah L; Graham, and Wendy J

2017-01-01

Abstract Recent national surveys in The United Republic of Tanzania have revealed poor standards of hygiene at birth in facilities. As more women opt for institutional delivery, improving basic hygiene becomes an essential part of preventative strategies for reducing puerperal and newborn sepsis. Our collaborative research in Zanzibar provides an in-depth picture of the state of hygiene on maternity wards to inform action. Hygiene was assessed in 2014 across all 37 facilities with a maternity unit in Zanzibar. We used a mixed methods approach, including structured and semi-structured interviews, and environmental microbiology. Data were analysed according to the WHO ‘cleans’ framework, focusing on the fundamental practices for prevention of newborn and maternal sepsis. For each ‘clean’ we explored the following enabling factors: knowledge, infrastructure (including equipment), staffing levels and policies. Composite indices were constructed for the enabling factors of the ‘cleans’ from the quantitative data: clean hands, cord cutting, and birth surface. Results from the qualitative tools were used to complement this information. Only 49% of facilities had the ‘infrastructural’ requirements to enable ‘clean hands’, with the availability of constant running water particularly lacking. Less than half (46%) of facilities met the ‘knowledge’ requirements for ensuring a ‘clean delivery surface’; six out of seven facilities had birthing surfaces that tested positive for multiple potential pathogens. Almost two thirds of facilities met the ‘infrastructure (equipment) requirement’ for ‘clean cord’; however, disposable cord clamps being frequently out of stock, often resulted in the use of non-sterile thread made of fabric. This mixed methods approach, and the analytical framework based on the WHO ‘cleans’ and the enabling factors, yielded practical information of direct relevance to action at local and ministerial levels. The same approach could be applied to collect and analyse data on infection prevention from maternity units in other contexts. PMID:28931118

Unmanned Aerial Systems, Moored Balloons, and the U.S. Department of Energy ARM Facilities in Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ivey, Mark; Verlinde, Johannes

2014-05-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), through its scientific user facility, the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility, provides scientific infrastructure and data to the international Arctic research community via its research sites located on the North Slope of Alaska. Facilities and infrastructure to support operations of unmanned aerial systems for science missions in the Arctic and North Slope of Alaska were established at Oliktok Point Alaska in 2013. Tethered instrumented balloons will be used in the near future to make measurements of clouds in the boundary layer including mixed-phase clouds. The DOE ARM Program has operated an atmospheric measurement facility in Barrow, Alaska, since 1998. Major upgrades to this facility, including scanning radars, were added in 2010. Arctic Observing Networks are essential to meet growing policy, social, commercial, and scientific needs. Calibrated, high-quality arctic geophysical datasets that span ten years or longer are especially important for climate studies, climate model initializations and validations, and for related climate policy activities. For example, atmospheric data and derived atmospheric forcing estimates are critical for sea-ice simulations. International requirements for well-coordinated, long-term, and sustained Arctic Observing Networks and easily-accessible data sets collected by those networks have been recognized by many high-level workshops and reports (Arctic Council Meetings and workshops, National Research Council reports, NSF workshops and others). The recent Sustaining Arctic Observation Network (SAON) initiative sponsored a series of workshops to "develop a set of recommendations on how to achieve long-term Arctic-wide observing activities that provide free, open, and timely access to high-quality data that will realize pan-Arctic and global value-added services and provide societal benefits." This poster will present information on opportunities for members of the arctic research community to make atmospheric measurements using unmanned aerial systems or tethered balloons.

Social Media Principles Applied to Critical Infrastructure Information Sharing

DTIC Science & Technology

2013-12-01

shooters. The DHS works throughout the year to build partnerships with industries across a wide spectrum, to include commercial facilities. They...security professionals , industry association and security organizations, emergency managers, and planners and architects. Each of these stakeholder sets... Project Report.126 The DARPA SCP fellows identified 14 factors that affected the performance of any one team. Notable among the collection were

Centre for Research Infrastructure of Polish GNSS Data - response and possible contribution to EPOS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Araszkiewicz, Andrzej; Rohm, Witold; Bosy, Jaroslaw; Szolucha, Marcin; Kaplon, Jan; Kroszczynski, Krzysztof

2017-04-01

In the frame of the first call under Action 4.2: Development of modern research infrastructure of the science sector in the Smart Growth Operational Programme 2014-2020 in the late of 2016 the "EPOS-PL" project has launched. Following institutes are responsible for the implementation of this project: Institute of Geophysics, Polish Academy of Sciences - Project Leader, Academic Computer Centre Cyfronet AGH University of Science and Technology, Central Mining Institute, the Institute of Geodesy and Cartography, Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Military University of Technology. In addition, resources constituting entrepreneur's own contribution will come from the Polish Mining Group. Research Infrastructure EPOS-PL will integrate both existing and newly built National Research Infrastructures (Theme Centre for Research Infrastructures), which, under the premise of the program EPOS, are financed exclusively by the national founds. In addition, the e-science platform will be developed. The Centre for Research Infrastructure of GNSS Data (CIBDG - Task 5) will be built based on the experience and facilities of two institutions: Military University of Technology and Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences. The project includes the construction of the National GNNS Repository with data QC procedures and adaptation of two Regional GNNS Analysis Centres for rapid and long-term geodynamical monitoring.

Spatial modeling of infrastructure resilience to the natural disasters using baseline resilience indicators for communities (BRIC) - Case study: 5 districts/cities of Bandung Basin area

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nafishoh, Qoriatun; Riqqi, Akhmad; Meilano, Irwan

2017-07-01

The Bandung Basin area has highly susceptible to the natural disasters. Therefore, resilience measurement is useful to find out the capacity of an area in the facing of a natural disaster. Natural disaster resilience can be measured using BRIC (Baseline Resilience Indicators for Communities) model. This model comprises several indicators; includes social, economic, community, institution, infrastructure, and the environment. This research tries to measure resilience to the natural disasters with still focusing on infrastructure resilience measurement by spatial modeling and analyzed the dominant driving factor that contributes to this resilience trend. We generated a spatial modeling by applying a spatial analysis to the infrastructure objects. The infrastructure objects consist of the road, school, and health facilities. Those objects will be given some radius levels that indicate the resilience level by using buffer processing. An area closest to those objects will have high resilience and contrarily. Our result showed that almost all city areas (Bandung and Cimahi City) have high resilience because they have many infrastructure objects. But contrarily with the district areas which are still contained many patterns of low and moderate resilience level. The dominant driving factor of infrastructure resilience in this research area is a road. The areas which are closest to the road have high resilience and farther away from the road will have low resilience.

Australia's TERN: Advancing Ecosystem Data Management in Australia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Phinn, S. R.; Christensen, R.; Guru, S.

2013-12-01

Globally, there is a consistent movement towards more open, collaborative and transparent science, where the publication and citation of data is considered standard practice. Australia's Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN) is a national research infrastructure investment designed to support the ecosystem science community through all stages of the data lifecycle. TERN has developed and implemented a comprehensive network of ';hard' and ';soft' infrastructure that enables Australia's ecosystem scientists to collect, publish, store, share, discover and re-use data in ways not previously possible. The aim of this poster is to demonstrate how TERN has successfully delivered infrastructure that is enabling a significant cultural and practical shift in Australia's ecosystem science community towards consistent approaches for data collection, meta-data, data licensing, and data publishing. TERN enables multiple disciplines, within the ecosystem sciences to more effectively and efficiently collect, store and publish their data. A critical part of TERN's approach has been to build on existing data collection activities, networks and skilled people to enable further coordination and collaboration to build each data collection facility and coordinate data publishing. Data collection in TERN is through discipline based facilities, covering long term collection of: (1) systematic plot based measurements of vegetation structure, composition and faunal biodiversity; (2) instrumented towers making systematic measurements of solar, water and gas fluxes; and (3) satellite and airborne maps of biophysical properties of vegetation, soils and the atmosphere. Several other facilities collect and integrate environmental data to produce national products for fauna and vegetation surveys, soils and coastal data, as well as integrated or synthesised products for modelling applications. Data management, publishing and sharing in TERN are implemented through a tailored data licensing framework suitable for ecosystem data, national standards for metadata, a DOI-minting service, and context-appropriate data repositories and portals. The TERN Data infrastructure is based on loosely coupled 'network of networks.' Overall, the data formats used across the TERN facilities vary from NetCDF, comma-separated values and descriptive documents. Metadata standards include ISO19115, Ecological Metadata Language and rich semantic enabled contextual information. Data services vary from Web Mapping Service, Web Feature Service, OpeNDAP, file servers and KNB Metacat. These approaches enable each data collection facility to maintain their discipline based data collection and storage protocols. TERN facility meta-data are harvested regularly for the central TERN Data Discovery Portal and converted to a national standard format. This approach enables centralised discovery, access, and re-use of data simply and effectively, while maintaining disciplinary diversity. Effort is still required to support the cultural shift towards acceptance of effective data management, publication, sharing and re-use as standard practice. To this end TERN's future activities will be directed to supporting this transformation and undertaking ';education' to enable ecosystem scientists to take full advantage of TERN's infrastructure, and providing training and guidance for best practice data management.

Quantitative Analysis of the Educational Infrastructure in Colombia Through the Use of a Georeferencing Software and Analytic Hierarchy Process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cala Estupiñan, Jose Luis; María González Bernal, Lina; Ponz Tienda, Jose Luis; Gutierrez Bucheli, Laura Andrea; Alejandro Arboleda, Carlos

2017-10-01

The distribution policies of the national budget have been showing an increasing trend of the investment in education infrastructure. This is the reason that makes it necessary to identify the territories with the greatest number of facilities (such as schools, colleges, universities and libraries) and those lacking this type of infrastructure, in order to know where a possible government intervention is required. This work is not intended to give a judgment on the qualitative state of the national infrastructure. It focuses, in terms of infrastructure, on Colombia’s quantitative status of the educational sector, by identifying the territories with more facilities, such as schools, colleges, universities and public libraries. To do this a quantitative index will be created to identify if the coverage of educational infrastructure at departmental level is enough, by taking into account not only the number of facilities, but also the population and the area of influence each one has. The above study is framed within a project of the University of the Andes called “visible Infrastructure”. The index is obtained through a hierarchical analytical process (AHP) and subsequently a linear equation that reflects the variables investigated. The validation of this index is performed through correlations and regressions of social, economic and cultural indicators determined by official entities. All the information on which the analysis is based is official and public. With the end of the armed conflict, it is necessary to focus the planning of public policies to heal the social gaps that the most vulnerable population needs.

The correlation of housing estate area with regional infrastructure development in peri-urban region of metropolitan Bandung Raya

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vitriana, A. N. I. T. A.

2018-03-01

Housing estates development in the peri-urban area is often used as a solution to meet the needs of urban housing. In this case, the development of housing estates built by developers, are including housing units as well as the facilities and infrastructure. Based on this practice, then two opposite opinions emerge about the participation of developers in the development of housing infrastructure. The first opinion acknowledges that residential developers have assisted the government in providing settlement infrastructure. Meanwhile, the second opinion considers the infrastructure development undertaken by the residential developers has precisely caused inefficient regional infrastructure development. This study aims to examine the correlation between the development of housing estates and the development of regional infrastructure by using simple linear regression analyses, in order to prove whether there is a relationship between the two variables. This research was conducted at West Bandung Regency (Kabupaten Bandung Barat), one of the regency that located in peri-urban of Metropolitan Bandung Area. Two variables used in this study consist of the area of housing estates variable and the infrastructure development variable. The infrastructure development variable is represented by The IKG score (Geographic Difficulties Index). In this study, two different levels of the area were conducted to the examination, the village, and the subdistrict. The result of this examination shows that there is a weak correlation between the variables of the housing estates area and The IKG, even though its relationship is getting stronger when the test performed on a larger area. Based on this research, it can be said that the development of housing estates infrastructure in West Bandung Regency has a lack of significant effect on the regional infrastructure development.

The role of trees in urban stormwater management | Science ...

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

Urban impervious surfaces convert precipitation to stormwater runoff, which causes water quality and quantity problems. While traditional stormwater management has relied on gray infrastructure such as piped conveyances to collect and convey stormwater to wastewater treatment facilities or into surface waters, cities are exploring green infrastructure to manage stormwater at its source. Decentralized green infrastructure leverages the capabilities of soil and vegetation to infiltrate, redistribute, and otherwise store stormwater volume, with the potential to realize ancillary environmental, social, and economic benefits. To date, green infrastructure science and practice have largely focused on infiltration-based technologies that include rain gardens, bioswales, and permeable pavements. However, a narrow focus on infiltration overlooks other losses from the hydrologic cycle, and we propose that arboriculture – the cultivation of trees and other woody plants – deserves additional consideration as a stormwater control measure. Trees interact with the urban hydrologic cycle by intercepting incoming precipitation, removing water from the soil via transpiration, enhancing infiltration, and bolstering the performance of other green infrastructure technologies. However, many of these interactions are inadequately understood, particularly at spatial and temporal scales relevant to stormwater management. As such, the reliable use of trees for stormwater control depe

Transportation systems analyses. Volume 2: Technical/programmatics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

1993-05-01

The principal objective of this study is to accomplish a systems engineering assessment of the nation's space transportation infrastructure. This analysis addresses the necessary elements to perform man delivery and return, cargo transfer, cargo delivery, payload servicing, and the exploration of the Moon and Mars. Specific elements analyzed, but not limited to, include the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI), the National Launch System (NLS), the current expendable launch vehicle (ELV) fleet, ground facilities, the Space Station Freedom (SSF), and other civil, military and commercial payloads. The performance of this study entails maintaining a broad perspective on the large number of transportation elements that could potentially comprise the U.S. space infrastructure over the next several decades. To perform this systems evaluation, top-level trade studies are conducted to enhance our understanding of the relationships between elements of the infrastructure. This broad 'infrastructure-level perspective' permits the identification of preferred infrastructures. Sensitivity analyses are performed to assure the credibility and usefulness of study results. This report documents the three principal transportation systems analyses (TSA) efforts during the period 7 November 92 - 6 May 93. The analyses are as follows: Mixed-Fleet (STS/ELV) strategies for SSF resupply; Transportation Systems Data Book - overview; and Operations Cost Model - overview/introduction.

The home hemodialysis hub: physical infrastructure and integrated governance structure.

PubMed

Marshall, Mark R; Young, Bessie A; Fox, Sally J; Cleland, Calli J; Walker, Robert J; Masakane, Ikuto; Herold, Aaron M

2015-04-01

An effective home hemodialysis program critically depends on adequate hub facilities and support functions and on transparent and accountable organizational processes. The likelihood of optimal service delivery and patient care will be enhanced by fit-for-purpose facilities and implementation of a well-considered governance structure. In this article, we describe the required accommodation and infrastructure for a home hemodialysis program and a generic organizational structure that will support both patient-facing clinical activities and business processes. © 2015 International Society for Hemodialysis.

The Australian Integrated Marine Observing System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Proctor, R.; Meyers, G.; Roughan, M.; Operators, I.

2008-12-01

The Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) is a 92M project established with 50M from the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) and co-investments from 10 operators including Universities and government agencies (see below). It is a nationally distributed set of equipment established and maintained at sea, oceanographic data and information services that collectively will contribute to meeting the needs of marine research in both open oceans and over the continental shelf around Australia. In particular, if sustained in the long term, it will permit identification and management of climate change in the marine environment, an area of research that is as yet almost a blank page, studies relevant to conservation of marine biodiversity and research on the role of the oceans in the climate system. While as an NCRIS project IMOS is intended to support research, the data streams are also useful for many societal, environmental and economic applications, such as management of offshore industries, safety at sea, management of marine ecosystems and fisheries and tourism. The infrastructure also contributes to Australia's commitments to international programs of ocean observing and international conventions, such as the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention that established the Australian Exclusive Economic Zone, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Global Ocean Observing System and the intergovernmental coordinating activity Global Earth Observation System of Systems. IMOS is made up of nine national facilities that collect data, using different components of infrastructure and instruments, and two facilities that manage and provide access to data and enhanced data products, one for in situ data and a second for remotely sensed satellite data. The observing facilities include three for the open (bluewater) ocean (Argo Australia, Enhanced Ships of Opportunity and Southern Ocean Time Series), three facilities for coastal currents and water properties (Moorings, Ocean Gliders and HF Radar) and three for coastal ecosystems (Acoustic Tagging and Tracking, Autonomous Underwater Vehicle and a biophysical sensor network on the Great Barrier Reef). The value from this infrastructure investment lies in the coordinated deployment of a wide range of equipment aimed at deriving critical data sets that serve multiple applications. Additional information on IMOS is available at the website (http://www.imos.org.au). The IMOS Operators are Australian Institute of Marine Science, James Cook University, Sydney Institute of Marine Science, Geoscience Australia, Bureau of Meteorology, South Australia Research and Development Institute, University of Western Australia, Curtin University of Technology, CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, University of Tasmania.

Distribution of green infrastructure along walkable roads

EPA Science Inventory

Low-income and minority neighborhoods frequently lack healthful resources to which wealthier communities have access. Though important, the addition of facilities such as recreation centers can be costly and take time to implement. Urban green infrastructure, such as street trees...

Implications of Intermodal Freight Movements for Infrastructure Access, Capacity, and Productivity

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1996-03-31

This report evaluates the status of intermodal freight in the U.S. with reference to infrastructure access problems such as inadequate highway connectors and facility clearance, and terminal capacity constraints affecting levels of service. Though th...

Climate Change Adaptation Activities at the NASA John F. Kennedy Space Center, FL., USA

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hall, Carlton; Phillips, Lynne

2016-01-01

In 2010, the Office of Strategic Infrastructure and Earth Sciences established the Climate Adaptation Science Investigators (CASI) program to integrate climate change forecasts and knowledge into sustainable management of infrastructure and operations needed for the NASA mission. NASA operates 10 field centers valued at $32 billion dollars, occupies 191,000 acres and employs 58,000 people. CASI climate change and sea-level rise forecasts focus on the 2050 and 2080 time periods. At the 140,000 acre Kennedy Space Center (KSC) data are used to simulate impacts on infrastructure, operations, and unique natural resources. KSC launch and processing facilities represent a valued national asset located in an area with high biodiversity including 33 species of special management concern. Numerical and advanced Bayesian and Monte Carlo statistical modeling is being conducted using LiDAR digital elevation models coupled with relevant GIS layers to assess potential future conditions. Results are provided to the Environmental Management Branch, Master Planning, Construction of Facilities, Engineering Construction Innovation Committee and our regional partners to support Spaceport development, management, and adaptation planning and design. Potential impacts to natural resources include conversion of 50% of the Center to open water, elevation of the surficial aquifer, alterations of rainfall and evapotranspiration patterns, conversion of salt marsh to mangrove forest, reductions in distribution and extent of upland habitats, overwash of the barrier island dune system, increases in heat stress days, and releases of chemicals from legacy contamination sites. CASI has proven successful in bringing climate change planning to KSC including recognition of the need to increase resiliency and development of a green managed shoreline retreat approach to maintain coastal ecosystem services while maximizing life expectancy of Center launch and payload processing resources.

Climate Change Adaptation Activities at the NASA John F. Kennedy Space Center, Fl., USA

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hall, C. R.; Phillips, L. V.; Foster, T.; Stolen, E.; Duncan, B.; Hunt, D.; Schaub, R.

2016-12-01

In 2010, the Office of Strategic Infrastructure and Earth Sciences established the Climate Adaptation Science Investigators (CASI) program to integrate climate change forecasts and knowledge into sustainable management of infrastructure and operations needed for the NASA mission. NASA operates 10 field centers valued at $32 billion dollars, occupies 191,000 acres and employs 58,000 people. CASI climate change and sea-level rise forecasts focus on the 2050 and 2080 time periods. At the 140,000 acre Kennedy Space Center (KSC) data are used to simulate impacts on infrastructure, operations, and unique natural resources. KSC launch and processing facilities represent a valued national asset located in an area with high biodiversity including 33 species of special management concern. Numerical and advanced Bayesian and Monte Carlo statistical modeling is being conducted using LiDAR digital elevation models coupled with relevant GIS layers to assess potential future conditions. Results are provided to the Environmental Management Branch, Master Planning, Construction of Facilities, Engineering Construction Innovation Committee and our regional partners to support Spaceport development, management, and adaptation planning and design. Potential impacts to natural resources include conversion of 50% of the Center to open water, elevation of the surficial aquifer, alterations of rainfall and evapotranspiration patterns, conversion of salt marsh to mangrove forest, reductions in distribution and extent of upland habitats, overwash of the barrier island dune system, increases in heat stress days, and releases of chemicals from legacy contamination sites. CASI has proven successful in bringing climate change planning to KSC including recognition of the need to increase resiliency and development of a green managed shoreline retreat approach to maintain coastal ecosystem services while maximizing life expectancy of Center launch and payload processing resources.

Integrated Payment And Delivery Models Offer Opportunities And Challenges For Residential Care Facilities.

PubMed

Grabowski, David C; Caudry, Daryl J; Dean, Katie M; Stevenson, David G

2015-10-01

Under health care reform, new financing and delivery models are being piloted to integrate health and long-term care services for older adults. Programs using these models generally have not included residential care facilities. Instead, most of them have focused on long-term care recipients in the community or the nursing home. Our analyses indicate that individuals living in residential care facilities have similarly high rates of chronic illness and Medicare utilization when compared with matched individuals in the community and nursing home, and rates of functional dependency that fall between those of their counterparts in the other two settings. These results suggest that the residential care facility population could benefit greatly from models that coordinated health and long-term care services. However, few providers have invested in the infrastructure needed to support integrated delivery models. Challenges to greater care integration include the private-pay basis for residential care facility services, which precludes shared savings from reduced Medicare costs, and residents' preference for living in a home-like, noninstitutional environment. Project HOPE—The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

44 CFR 201.4 - Standard State Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... State owned or operated buildings, infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified... vulnerable to damage and loss associated with hazard events. State owned or operated critical facilities...

44 CFR 201.4 - Standard State Mitigation Plans.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... State owned or operated buildings, infrastructure, and critical facilities located in the identified... vulnerable to damage and loss associated with hazard events. State owned or operated critical facilities...

Resilience: Theory and Application.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Carlson, J.L.; Haffenden, R.A.; Bassett, G.W.

2012-02-03

There is strong agreement among policymakers, practitioners, and academic researchers that the concept of resilience must play a major role in assessing the extent to which various entities - critical infrastructure owners and operators, communities, regions, and the Nation - are prepared to respond to and recover from the full range of threats they face. Despite this agreement, consensus regarding important issues, such as how resilience should be defined, assessed, and measured, is lacking. The analysis presented here is part of a broader research effort to develop and implement assessments of resilience at the asset/facility and community/regional levels. The literaturemore » contains various definitions of resilience. Some studies have defined resilience as the ability of an entity to recover, or 'bounce back,' from the adverse effects of a natural or manmade threat. Such a definition assumes that actions taken prior to the occurrence of an adverse event - actions typically associated with resistance and anticipation - are not properly included as determinants of resilience. Other analyses, in contrast, include one or more of these actions in their definitions. To accommodate these different definitions, we recognize a subset of resistance- and anticipation-related actions that are taken based on the assumption that an adverse event is going to occur. Such actions are in the domain of resilience because they reduce both the immediate and longer-term adverse consequences that result from an adverse event. Recognizing resistance- and anticipation-related actions that take the adverse event as a given accommodates the set of resilience-related actions in a clear-cut manner. With these considerations in mind, resilience can be defined as: 'the ability of an entity - e.g., asset, organization, community, region - to anticipate, resist, absorb, respond to, adapt to, and recover from a disturbance.' Because critical infrastructure resilience is important both in its own right and because of its implications for community/regional resilience, it is especially important to develop a sound methodology for assessing resilience at the asset/facility level. This objective will be accomplished by collecting data on four broadly defined groups of resilience-enhancing measures: preparedness, mitigation measures, response capabilities, and recovery mechanisms. Table ES-1 illustrates how the six components that define resilience are connected to the actions that enhance the capacity of an entity to be resilient. The relationships illustrated in Table ES-1 provide the framework for developing a survey instrument that will be used to elicit the information required to assess resilience at the asset/facility level. The resilience of a community/region is a function of the resilience of its subsystems, including its critical infrastructures, economy, civil society, governance (including emergency services), and supply chains/dependencies. The number and complexity of these subsystems will make the measurement of resilience more challenging as we move from individual assets/facilities to the community/regional level (where critical infrastructure resilience is only one component). Specific challenges include uncertainty about relationships (e.g., the composition of specific supply chains), data gaps, and time and budget constraints that prevent collection of all of the information needed to construct a comprehensive assessment of the resilience of a specific community or region. These challenges can be addressed, at least partially, by adopting a 'systems approach' to the assessment of resilience. In a systems approach, the extent to which the analysis addresses the resilience of the individual subsystems can vary. Specifically, high-level systems analysis can be used to identify the most important lower-level systems. In turn, within the most important lower-level systems, site assessment data should be collected only on the most critical asset-level components about which the least is known. Implementation of the strategies outlined here to assess resilience will facilitate the following four objectives: (1) Develop a methodology and supporting products to assess resilience at the asset/facility level, (2) Develop a methodology and supporting products to assess resilience at the critical infrastructure sector level, (3) Provide resilience-related information to critical infrastructure owners/operators to facilitate risk-based resource decision making, and (4) Provide resilience-related information to State and local mission partners to support their risk-based resource decision making.« less

University of Wisconsin Ion Beam Laboratory: A facility for irradiated materials and ion beam analysis

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Field, K. G.; Wetteland, C. J.; Cao, G.

2013-04-19

The University of Wisconsin Ion Beam Laboratory (UW-IBL) has recently undergone significant infrastructure upgrades to facilitate graduate level research in irradiated materials phenomena and ion beam analysis. A National Electrostatics Corp. (NEC) Torodial Volume Ion Source (TORVIS), the keystone upgrade for the facility, can produce currents of hydrogen ions and helium ions up to {approx}200 {mu}A and {approx}5 {mu}A, respectively. Recent upgrades also include RBS analysis packages, end station developments for irradiation of relevant material systems, and the development of an in-house touch screen based graphical user interface for ion beam monitoring. Key research facilitated by these upgrades includes irradiationmore » of nuclear fuels, studies of interfacial phenomena under irradiation, and clustering dynamics of irradiated oxide dispersion strengthened steels. The UW-IBL has also partnered with the Advanced Test Reactor National Scientific User Facility (ATR-NSUF) to provide access to the irradiation facilities housed at the UW-IBL as well as access to post irradiation facilities housed at the UW Characterization Laboratory for Irradiated Materials (CLIM) and other ATR-NSUF partner facilities. Partnering allows for rapid turnaround from proposed research to finalized results through the ATR-NSUF rapid turnaround proposal system. An overview of the UW-IBL including CLIM and relevant research is summarized.« less

Environmental impacts of dispersed development from federal infrastructure projects.

PubMed

Southerland, Mark T

2004-06-01

Dispersed development, also referred to as urban growth or sprawl, is a pattern of low-density development spread over previously rural landscapes. Such growth can result in adverse impacts to air quality, water quality, human health, aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, agricultural land, military training areas, water supply and wastewater treatment, recreational resources, viewscapes, and cultural resources. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) is charged with protecting public health and the environment, which includes consideration of impacts from dispersed development. Specifically, because federal infrastructure projects can affect the progress of dispersed development, the secondary impacts resulting from it must be assessed in documents prepared under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) has oversight for NEPA and Section 309 of the Clean Air Act requires that U.S. EPA review and comment on federal agency NEPA documents. The adverse effects of dispersed development can be induced by federal infrastructure projects including transportation, built infrastructure, modifications in natural infrastructure, public land conversion and redevelopment of properties, construction of federal facilities, and large traffic or major growth generation developments requiring federal permits. This paper presents an approach that U.S. EPA reviewers and NEPA practitioners can use to provide accurate, realistic, and consistent analysis of secondary impacts of dispersed development resulting from federal infrastructure projects. It also presents 24 measures that can be used to mitigate adverse impacts from dispersed development by modifying project location and design, participating in preservation or restoration activities, or informing and supporting local communities in planning.

Commercial Space Port Planning in Texas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bell, L.; Looke, B.

2002-01-01

The Texas Legislature is providing funding to support research and planning activities aimed at creating a commercial spaceport in the state. These monies have been allocated to regional Spaceport Development Corporations that have been established in three countries containing candidate site locations: Willacy County (in South Texas); Brazoria County (East Texas); and Pecos County (West Texas). This program is being sponsored and coordinated by the Texas Aerospace Commission (TAC). The Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture (SICSA) at the University of Houston is providing research, planning and design support to TAC and is a member of each of the three regional development teams. Planning must carefully consider special support requirements and operational characteristics of all prospective launch systems along with geographic, infrastructure and environmental factors at each site. Two of the candidate sites are in coastal areas; a priority for certain launch service providers; whereas the third inland site is more attractive to others. Candidate launch systems include winged horizontal takeoff air-launch vehicles, vertical multi-stage reusable launch vehicles, and expendable sub-orbital surrounding rockets. Important research and planning activities include environmental impact assessments, analyses of overflight hazards, investigations of economic impacts and business plan development. The results of these activities will guide master plan development for each site, including: a physical plan (site layout, infrastructure improvements and facility construction); and a strategic plan (user agreements, licenses, finance sources and participants). Commercial spaceport development demands compliance with stringent FAA regulations established by the Office of Commercial Space Transportation (OCST) which exceed minimum standards allowed for U.S. Government spaceport facilities. Key among these requirements are 15,000 ft. radius on-site clear zones separating launch areas form inhabited facilities, and extremely conservative flight risk restrictions associated with launch trajectories over populated areas. Unless modified, the flight risk criteria currently mandated will prevent virtually all new U.S. commercial spaceport operating license proposals from being approved. Commercial spaceport development also presents significant financing challenges. New launch service companies typically lack substantial economic resources needed for infrastructure construction such as long horizontal runways, launch platforms and vehicle assembly and payload integration facilities. Outside investment sources much be identified, with supplementary revenues potentially derived from space tourism and ancillary public service uses. Texas spaceport planning sponsors, participants and advocates recognize that such a development warrants the necessary investment. It will support the advancement and services of new generations of launch systems vitally needed to reduce the high costs of space access. It will afford new state-wide, regional and local economic development opportunities that promote business investments, create jobs and expand infrastructure resources. It will also support a wide spectrum of educational objectives by including and serving academic programs at all levels. Regardless which site is ultimately selected, all Texas regions and public interests in general will benefit.

New Geodetic Infrastructure for Australia: The NCRIS / AuScope Geospatial Component

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tregoning, P.; Watson, C. S.; Coleman, R.; Johnston, G.; Lovell, J.; Dickey, J.; Featherstone, W. E.; Rizos, C.; Higgins, M.; Priebbenow, R.

2009-12-01

In November 2006, the Australian Federal Government announced AUS15.8M in funding for geospatial research infrastructure through the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). Funded within a broader capability area titled ‘Structure and Evolution of the Australian Continent’, NCRIS has provided a significant investment across Earth imaging, geochemistry, numerical simulation and modelling, the development of a virtual core library, and geospatial infrastructure. Known collectively as AuScope (www.auscope.org.au), this capability area has brought together Australian’s leading Earth scientists to decide upon the most pressing scientific issues and infrastructure needs for studying Earth systems and their impact on the Australian continent. Importantly and at the same time, the investment in geospatial infrastructure offers the opportunity to raise Australian geodetic science capability to the highest international level into the future. The geospatial component of AuScope builds onto the AUS15.8M of direct funding through the NCRIS process with significant in-kind and co-investment from universities and State/Territory and Federal government departments. The infrastructure to be acquired includes an FG5 absolute gravimeter, three gPhone relative gravimeters, three 12.1 m radio telescopes for geodetic VLBI, a continent-wide network of continuously operating geodetic quality GNSS receivers, a trial of a mobile SLR system and access to updated cluster computing facilities. We present an overview of the AuScope geospatial capability, review the current status of the infrastructure procurement and discuss some examples of the scientific research that will utilise the new geospatial infrastructure.

Field Work Proposal: PUBLIC OUTREACH EVENT FOR ACCELERATOR STEWARDSHIP TEST FACILITY PILOT PROGRAM

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hutton, Andrew; Areti, Hari

2015-03-05

Jefferson Lab’s outreach efforts towards the goals of Accelerator Stewardship Test Facility Pilot Program consist of the lab’s efforts in three venues. The first venue, at the end of March is to meet with the members of Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center (VTCRC) (http://www.vtcrc.com/tenant-directory/) in Blacksburg, Virginia. Of the nearly 160 members, we expect that many engineering companies (including mechanical, electrical, bio, software) will be present. To this group, we will describe the capabilities of Jefferson Lab’s accelerator infrastructure. The description will include not only the facilities but also the intellectual expertise. No funding is requested for this effort. Themore » second venue is to reach the industrial exhibitors at the 6th International Particle Accelerator Conference (IPAC’15). Jefferson Lab will host a booth at the conference to reach out to the >75 industrial exhibitors (https://www.jlab.org/conferences/ipac2015/SponsorsExhibitors.php) who represent a wide range of technologies. A number of these industries could benefit if they can access Jefferson Lab’s accelerator infrastructure. In addition to the booth, where written material will be available, we plan to arrange a session A/V presentation to the industry exhibitors. The booth will be hosted by Jefferson Lab’s Public Relations staff, assisted on a rotating basis by the lab’s scientists and engineers. The budget with IPAC’15 designations represents the request for funds for this effort. The third venue is the gathering of Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA) university presidents. Here we plan to reach the research departments of the universities who can benefit by availing themselves to the infrastructure (material sciences, engineering, medical schools, material sciences, to name a few). Funding is requested to allow for attendance at the SURA Board Meeting. We are coordinating with DOE regarding these costs to raise the projected conference management cost ceiling in the Conference Management Tool.« less

Kennedy Space Center: Apollo to Multi-User Spaceport

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Weber, Philip J.; Kanner, Howard S.

2017-01-01

NASA Kennedy Space Center (KSC) was established as the gateway to exploring beyond earth. Since the establishment of KSC in December 1963, the Center has been critical in the execution of the United States of Americas bold mission to send astronauts beyond the grasp of the terra firma. On May 25, 1961, a few weeks after a Soviet cosmonaut became the first person to fly in space, President John F. Kennedy laid out the ambitious goal of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth by the end of the decade. The resultant Apollo program was massive endeavor, driven by the Cold War Space Race, and supported with a robust budget. The Apollo program consisted of 18 launches from newly developed infrastructure, including 12 manned missions and six lunar landings, ending with Apollo 17 that launched on December 7, 1972. Continuing to use this infrastructure, the Skylab program launched four missions. During the Skylab program, KSC infrastructure was redesigned to meet the needs of the Space Shuttle program, which launched its first vehicle (STS-1) on April 12, 1981. The Space Shuttle required significant modifications to the Apollo launch pads and assembly facilities, as well as new infrastructure, such as Orbiter and Payload Processing Facilities, as well as the Shuttle Landing Facility. The Space Shuttle was a workhorse that supported many satellite deployments, but was key for the construction and maintenance of the International Space Station, which required additional facilities at KSC to support processing of the flight hardware. After reaching the new Millennium, United States policymakers searched for new ways to reduce the cost of space exploration. The Constellation Program was initiated in 2005 with a goal of providing a crewed lunar landing with a much smaller budget. The very successful Space Shuttle made its last launch on July 8, 2011, after 135 missions. In the subsequent years, KSC continues to evolve, and this paper will address past and future efforts of the transformation of the KSC Apollo and Space Shuttle heritage infrastructure into a more versatile, multi-user spaceport. The paper will also discuss the US Congressional and NASA initiatives for developing and supporting multiple commercial partners, while simultaneously supporting NASAs human exploration initiative, consisting of Space Launch System (SLS), Orion spacecraft and associated ground launch systems. In addition, the paper explains the approach with examples for NASA KSC to leverage new technologies and innovative capabilities developed to reduce the cost to individual users.

Improving district facility readiness: a 12-month evaluation of a data-driven health systems strengthening intervention in rural Rwanda.

PubMed

Iyer, Hari S; Kamanzi, Emmanuel; Mugunga, Jean Claude; Finnegan, Karen; Uwingabiye, Alice; Shyaka, Edward; Niyonzima, Saleh; Hirschhorn, Lisa R; Drobac, Peter C

2015-01-01

While health systems strengthening (HSS) interventions are recommended by global health policy experts to improve population health in resource-limited settings, few examples exist of evaluations of HSS interventions conducted at the district level. In 2009, a partnership between Partners In Health (PIH), a non-governmental organization, and the Rwandan Ministry of Health (RMOH) was provided funds to implement and evaluate a district-level HSS intervention in two rural districts of Rwanda. The partnership provided limited funds to 14 health centers for targeted systems support in 2010; six others received support prior to the intervention (reference). RMOH health systems norms were mapped across the WHO HSS framework, scored from 0 to 10 and incorporated into a rapid survey assessing 11 domains of facility readiness. Stakeholder meetings allowed partnership leaders to review results, set priorities, and allocate resources. Investments included salary support, infrastructure improvements, medical equipment, and social support for patients. We compared facility domain scores from the start of the intervention to 12 months and tested for correlation between change in score and change in funding allocation to assess equity in our approach. We found significant improvements among intervention facilities from baseline to 12 months across several domains [infrastructure (+4, p=0.0001), clinical services (+1.2, p=0.03), infection and sanitation control (+0.6, p=0.03), medical equipment (+1.0, p=0.02), information use (+2, p=0.002)]. Composite score across domains improved from 6.2 at baseline to 7.4 at 12 months (p=0.002). Across facilities, 50% had composite scores greater than the average score among reference facilities (7.4) at 12 months compared to none at baseline. Rapid facility surveys, stakeholder engagement, and information feedback can be used for gap analysis and resource allocation. This approach can achieve effective use of limited resources, improve facility readiness, and ensure consistency of facility capacity to provide quality care at the district level.

Improving district facility readiness: a 12-month evaluation of a data-driven health systems strengthening intervention in rural Rwanda

PubMed Central

Iyer, Hari S.; Kamanzi, Emmanuel; Mugunga, Jean Claude; Finnegan, Karen; Uwingabiye, Alice; Shyaka, Edward; Niyonzima, Saleh; Hirschhorn, Lisa R.; Drobac, Peter C.

2015-01-01

Background While health systems strengthening (HSS) interventions are recommended by global health policy experts to improve population health in resource-limited settings, few examples exist of evaluations of HSS interventions conducted at the district level. In 2009, a partnership between Partners In Health (PIH), a non-governmental organization, and the Rwandan Ministry of Health (RMOH) was provided funds to implement and evaluate a district-level HSS intervention in two rural districts of Rwanda. Design The partnership provided limited funds to 14 health centers for targeted systems support in 2010; six others received support prior to the intervention (reference). RMOH health systems norms were mapped across the WHO HSS framework, scored from 0 to 10 and incorporated into a rapid survey assessing 11 domains of facility readiness. Stakeholder meetings allowed partnership leaders to review results, set priorities, and allocate resources. Investments included salary support, infrastructure improvements, medical equipment, and social support for patients. We compared facility domain scores from the start of the intervention to 12 months and tested for correlation between change in score and change in funding allocation to assess equity in our approach. Results We found significant improvements among intervention facilities from baseline to 12 months across several domains [infrastructure (+4, p=0.0001), clinical services (+1.2, p=0.03), infection and sanitation control (+0.6, p=0.03), medical equipment (+1.0, p=0.02), information use (+2, p=0.002)]. Composite score across domains improved from 6.2 at baseline to 7.4 at 12 months (p=0.002). Across facilities, 50% had composite scores greater than the average score among reference facilities (7.4) at 12 months compared to none at baseline. Conclusions Rapid facility surveys, stakeholder engagement, and information feedback can be used for gap analysis and resource allocation. This approach can achieve effective use of limited resources, improve facility readiness, and ensure consistency of facility capacity to provide quality care at the district level. PMID:26140729

Crowdsourcing Physical Network Topology Mapping With Net.Tagger

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-03-01

backend server infrastructure . This in- cludes a full security audit, better web services handling, and integration with the OSM stack and dataset to...a novel approach to network infrastructure mapping that combines smartphone apps with crowdsourced collection to gather data for offline aggregation...and analysis. The project aims to build a map of physical network infrastructure such as fiber-optic cables, facilities, and access points. The

Research Infrastructure and Scientific Collections: The Supply and Demand of Scientific Research

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Graham, E.; Schindel, D. E.

2016-12-01

Research infrastructure is essential in both experimental and observational sciences and is commonly thought of as single-sited facilities. In contrast, object-based scientific collections are distributed in nearly every way, including by location, taxonomy, geologic epoch, discipline, collecting processes, benefits sharing rules, and many others. These diffused collections may have been amassed for a particular discipline, but their potential for use and impact in other fields needs to be explored. Through a series of cross-disciplinary activities, Scientific Collections International (SciColl) has explored and developed new ways in which the supply of scientific collections can meet the demand of researchers in unanticipated ways. From cross-cutting workshops on emerging infectious diseases and food security, to an online portal of collections, SciColl aims to illustrate the scope and value of object-based scientific research infrastructure. As distributed infrastructure, the full impact of scientific collections to the research community is a result of discovering, utilizing, and networking these resources. Examples and case studies from infectious disease research, food security topics, and digital connectivity will be explored.

Implementation of tuberculosis infection control in health facilities in Mukono and Wakiso districts, Uganda

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Tuberculosis infection control (TBIC) is rarely implemented in the health facilities in resource limited settings. Understanding the reasons for low level of implementation is critical. The study aim was to assess TBIC practices and barriers to implementation in two districts in Uganda. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional study in 51 health facilities in districts of Mukono and Wakiso. The study included: a facility survey, observations of practices and eight focus group discussions with health workers. Results Quantitative: Only 16 facilities (31%) had a TBIC plan. Five facilities (10%) were screening patients for cough. Two facilities (4%) reported providing masks to patients with cough. Ventilation in the waiting areas was inadequate for TBIC in 43% (22/51) of the facilities. No facility possessed N95 particulate respirators. Qualitative: Barriers that hamper implementation of TBIC elicited included: under-staffing, lack of space for patient separation, lack of funds to purchase masks, and health workers not appreciating the importance of TBIC. Conclusion TBIC measures were not implemented in health facilities in the two Ugandan districts where the survey was done. Health system factors like lack of staff, space and funds are barriers to implement TBIC. Effective implementation of TBIC measures occurs when the fundamental health system building blocks -governance and stewardship, financing, infrastructure, procurement and supply chain management are in place and functioning appropriately. PMID:23915376

Implementation of tuberculosis infection control in health facilities in Mukono and Wakiso districts, Uganda.

PubMed

Buregyeya, Esther; Nuwaha, Fred; Verver, Suzanne; Criel, Bart; Colebunders, Robert; Wanyenze, Rhoda; Kalyango, Joan N; Katamba, Achilles; Mitchell, Ellen Mh

2013-08-01

Tuberculosis infection control (TBIC) is rarely implemented in the health facilities in resource limited settings. Understanding the reasons for low level of implementation is critical. The study aim was to assess TBIC practices and barriers to implementation in two districts in Uganda. We conducted a cross-sectional study in 51 health facilities in districts of Mukono and Wakiso. The study included: a facility survey, observations of practices and eight focus group discussions with health workers. Quantitative: Only 16 facilities (31%) had a TBIC plan. Five facilities (10%) were screening patients for cough. Two facilities (4%) reported providing masks to patients with cough. Ventilation in the waiting areas was inadequate for TBIC in 43% (22/51) of the facilities. No facility possessed N95 particulate respirators. Qualitative: Barriers that hamper implementation of TBIC elicited included: under-staffing, lack of space for patient separation, lack of funds to purchase masks, and health workers not appreciating the importance of TBIC. TBIC measures were not implemented in health facilities in the two Ugandan districts where the survey was done. Health system factors like lack of staff, space and funds are barriers to implement TBIC. Effective implementation of TBIC measures occurs when the fundamental health system building blocks--governance and stewardship, financing, infrastructure, procurement and supply chain management are in place and functioning appropriately.

Risk assessment for physical and cyber attacks on critical infrastructures.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smith, Bryan J.; Sholander, Peter E.; Phelan, James M.

2005-08-01

Assessing the risk of malevolent attacks against large-scale critical infrastructures requires modifications to existing methodologies. Existing risk assessment methodologies consider physical security and cyber security separately. As such, they do not accurately model attacks that involve defeating both physical protection and cyber protection elements (e.g., hackers turning off alarm systems prior to forced entry). This paper presents a risk assessment methodology that accounts for both physical and cyber security. It also preserves the traditional security paradigm of detect, delay and respond, while accounting for the possibility that a facility may be able to recover from or mitigate the results ofmore » a successful attack before serious consequences occur. The methodology provides a means for ranking those assets most at risk from malevolent attacks. Because the methodology is automated the analyst can also play 'what if with mitigation measures to gain a better understanding of how to best expend resources towards securing the facilities. It is simple enough to be applied to large infrastructure facilities without developing highly complicated models. Finally, it is applicable to facilities with extensive security as well as those that are less well-protected.« less

Liquid Rocket Engine Testing Overview

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rahman, Shamim

2005-01-01

Contents include the following: Objectives and motivation for testing. Technology, Research and Development Test and Evaluation (RDT&E), evolutionary. Representative Liquid Rocket Engine (LRE) test compaigns. Apollo, shuttle, Expandable Launch Vehicles (ELV) propulsion. Overview of test facilities for liquid rocket engines. Boost, upper stage (sea-level and altitude). Statistics (historical) of Liquid Rocket Engine Testing. LOX/LH, LOX/RP, other development. Test project enablers: engineering tools, operations, processes, infrastructure.

A Study of Facilities and Infrastructure Planning, Prioritization, and Assessment at Federal Security Laboratories

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-11-01

Research , Development, Test , and Evaluation (RDT&E) Appropriations The RDT&E appropriation consists of the mission program budgets for all... research , development, test and evaluation work performed by contractors and government installations and includes an installations and activities budget...than $4,000,000. 9 f. Research , Development, Test , and Evaluation Appropriations The Research , Development, Test , and Evaluation (RDT&E

How Diverse Schools Affect Student Mobility: Charter, Magnet, and Newly Built Institutions in Los Angeles. Los Angeles School Infrastructure Project. Working Paper

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dauter, Luke; Fuller, Bruce

2011-01-01

Everyone knows that student achievement often suffers when children and families move, leaving behind their school and neighborhood, yet, in urban districts like Los Angeles, mobility is now encouraged by the development of mixed-markets of diverse schools, including charter, pilot, and magnet schools in. Over 60 new school facilities were opened…

Identifying Indicators of State Change and Forecasting Future Vulnerability in Alaskan Boreal Ecosystems

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-08-01

ice have catastrophic effects on facilities, infrastructure, and military testing and training. Permafrost temperature , thickness, and geographic...treeline) and fire severity (~0 to ~100% SOL consumption ), they provide an excellent suite of sites to test and quantify the effects of fire severity...stages .........................59 Table 6.1. Variables included in explanatory matrix for black spruce dominance ............68 Table 6.2. Mixed effect

Identifying Indicators of State Change and Forecasting Future Vulnerability in Alaskan Boreal Ecosystems

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-08-01

catastrophic effects on facilities, infrastructure, and military testing and training. Permafrost temperature , thickness, and geographic continuity...and fire severity (~0 to ~100% SOL consumption ), they provide an excellent suite of sites to test and quantify the effects of fire severity on plant...59 Table 6.1. Variables included in explanatory matrix for black spruce dominance ............68 Table 6.2. Mixed effect model

FAST Center for Environmental Remediation, Fate and Transport of Hazardous Chemicals

DTIC Science & Technology

2003-07-01

Because of the FAST Center project, A&T will compete for funding and will make significant research contributions in environmental science and engineering....include: (1) development of infrastructure and facilities for environmental research at A&T (2) significant research contributions in environmental ... science and engineering, (3) graduation of 25 M.S. graduates in five different disciplines, (4) training of 16 undergraduate assistants, (5) publication

Using business intelligence for efficient inter-facility patient transfer.

PubMed

Haque, Waqar; Derksen, Beth Ann; Calado, Devin; Foster, Lee

2015-01-01

In the context of inter-facility patient transfer, a transfer operator must be able to objectively identify a destination which meets the needs of a patient, while keeping in mind each facility's limitations. We propose a solution which uses Business Intelligence (BI) techniques to analyze data related to healthcare infrastructure and services, and provides a web based system to identify optimal destination(s). The proposed inter-facility transfer system uses a single data warehouse with an Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) cube built on top that supplies analytical data to multiple reports embedded in web pages. The data visualization tool includes map based navigation of the health authority as well as an interactive filtering mechanism which finds facilities meeting the selected criteria. The data visualization is backed by an intuitive data entry web form which safely constrains the data, ensuring consistency and a single version of truth. The overall time required to identify the destination for inter-facility transfers is reduced from hours to a few minutes with this interactive solution.

23 CFR 500.101 - Purpose.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-04-01

... safety (SMS), traffic congestion (CMS), public transportation facilities and equipment (PTMS), and..., and implementation of a traffic monitoring system for highways and public transportation facilities... HIGHWAY ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE MANAGEMENT MANAGEMENT...

Eco-logical successes : fourth edition, March 2013

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-03-01

Infrastructure facilities, such as roadways, transit lines, and communication systems, provide vital services that support the healthy functioning of a community. While essential, sometimes the development of these facilities has negative environment...

Chapter 2. Surge capacity and infrastructure considerations for mass critical care. Recommendations and standard operating procedures for intensive care unit and hospital preparations for an influenza epidemic or mass disaster.

PubMed

Hick, John L; Christian, Michael D; Sprung, Charles L

2010-04-01

To provide recommendations and standard operating procedures for intensive care unit (ICU) and hospital preparations for a mass disaster or influenza epidemic with a specific focus on surge capacity and infrastructure considerations. Based on a literature review and expert opinion, a Delphi process was used to define the essential topics including surge capacity and infrastructure considerations. Key recommendations include: (1) hospitals should increase their ICU beds to the maximal extent by expanding ICU capacity and expanding ICUs into other areas; (2) hospitals should have appropriate beds and monitors for these expansion areas; hospitals should develop contingency plans at the facility and government (local, state, provincial, national) levels to provide additional ventilators; (3) hospitals should develop a phased staffing plan (nursing and physician) for ICUs that provides sufficient patient care supervision during contingency and crisis situations; (4) hospitals should provide expert input to the emergency management personnel at the hospital both during planning for surge capacity as well as during response; (5) hospitals should assure that adequate infrastructure support is present to support critical care activities; (6) hospitals should prioritize locations for expansion by expanding existing ICUs, using postanesthesia care units and emergency departments to capacity, then step-down units, large procedure suites, telemetry units and finally hospital wards. Judicious planning and adoption of protocols for surge capacity and infrastructure considerations are necessary to optimize outcomes during a pandemic.

Greenhouse gas emissions modeling : a tool for federal facility decommissioning

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2010-10-21

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) facility inventory is constantly changing as newer systems supplant older infrastructure in response to technological advances. Transformational change embodied by the FAAs Next Generation Air Transportati...

Revitalization of the NASA Langley Research Center's Infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Weiser, Erik S.; Mastaler, Michael D.; Craft, Stephen J.; Kegelman, Jerome T.; Hope, Drew J.; Mangum, Cathy H.

2012-01-01

The NASA Langley Research Center (Langley) was founded in 1917 as the nation's first civilian aeronautical research facility and NASA's first field center. For nearly 100 years, Langley has made significant contributions to the Aeronautics, Space Exploration, and Earth Science missions through research, technology, and engineering core competencies in aerosciences, materials, structures, the characterization of earth and planetary atmospheres and, more recently, in technologies associated with entry, descent, and landing. An unfortunate but inevitable outcome of this rich history is an aging infrastructure where the longest serving building is close to 80 years old and the average building age is 44 years old. In the current environment, the continued operation and maintenance of this aging and often inefficient infrastructure presents a real challenge to Center leadership in the trade space of sustaining infrastructure versus not investing in future capabilities. To address this issue, the Center has developed a forward looking revitalization strategy that ties future core competencies and technical capabilities to the Center Master Facility Plan to maintain a viable Center well into the future. This paper documents Langley's revitalization strategy which integrates the Center's missions, the Langley 2050 vision, the Center Master Facility Plan, and the New Town repair-by-replacement program through the leadership of the Vibrant Transformation to Advance Langley (ViTAL) Team.

A zebra or a painted horse? Are hospital PPPs infrastructure partnerships with stripes or a separate species?

PubMed

Montagu, Dominic; Harding, April

2012-01-01

Public Private Partnerships (PPP) have been common in infrastructure for many years and are increasingly being considered as a means to finance, build, and manage hospitals. However, the growth of hospital PPPs in the past two decades has led to confusion about what sorts of contractual arrangements between public and private partners consititute a PPP, and what key differences distinguish public private partnership for hospitals from PPPs for infrastructure. Based on experiences from around the world we indentify six key areas where hospital PPPs differ from infrastructure partnerships. We draw upon the hospital partnerships that have been documented in OECD countries and a growing number of middle-income countries to identify four distinct types of hospital PPPs: service focused partnerships in which private partners manage operations within publicly constructed facilities; facilities and finance PPPs, focused on mobilizing capital and creating new hospitals; combined PPPs, involving both facility and clinical operations; and co-located PPPs where privately operated services are developed within the grounds of a public hospital. These four types of hospital PPPs have differing goals, and therefore different contractual and functional aspects, as well as differing risks to both public and private partners. By clarifying these, we provide a base upon which hospital PPPs can be assessed against appropriate goals and benchmarks.

A Tool for Rating the Resilience of Critical Infrastructures in Extreme Fires

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-05-01

provide a tool for NRC to help the Canadian industry to develop extreme fire protection materials and technologies for critical infrastructures. Future...supported by the Canadian Safety and Security Program (CSSP) which is led by Defence Research and Development Canada’s Centre for Security Science, in...in oil refinery and chemical industry facilities. The only available standard in North America that addresses the transportation infrastructure is

Idaho National Laboratory 2015-2023 Ten-Year Site Plan

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sheryl Morton; Elizabeth Connell; Bill Buyers

2013-09-01

This Idaho National Laboratory (INL) Ten-Year Site Plan (TYSP) describes the strategy for accomplishing the long-term objective of sustaining the INL infrastructure to meet the Department of Energy Office of Nuclear Energy (DOE-NE) mission: to promote nuclear power as a resource capable of making major contributions in meeting the nation’s energy supply, environmental and energy security needs. This TYSP provides the strategy for INL to accomplish its mission by: (1) linking R&D mission goals to core capabilities and infrastructure requirements; (2) establishing a ten-year end-state vision for INL facility complexes; (3) identifying and prioritizing infrastructure needs and capability gaps; (4)more » establishing maintenance and repair strategies that allow for sustainment of mission-critical (MC) facilities; and (5) applying sustainability principles to each decision and action. The TYSP serves as the infrastructure-planning baseline for INL; and, though budget formulation documents are informed by the TYSP, it is not itself a budget document.« less

Research infrastructure support to address ecosystem dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Los, Wouter

2014-05-01

Predicting the evolution of ecosystems to climate change or human pressures is a challenge. Even understanding past or current processes is complicated as a result of the many interactions and feedbacks that occur within and between components of the system. This talk will present an example of current research on changes in landscape evolution, hydrology, soil biogeochemical processes, zoological food webs, and plant community succession, and how these affect feedbacks to components of the systems, including the climate system. Multiple observations, experiments, and simulations provide a wealth of data, but not necessarily understanding. Model development on the coupled processes on different spatial and temporal scales is sensitive for variations in data and of parameter change. Fast high performance computing may help to visualize the effect of these changes and the potential stability (and reliability) of the models. This may than allow for iteration between data production and models towards stable models reducing uncertainty and improving the prediction of change. The role of research infrastructures becomes crucial is overcoming barriers for such research. Environmental infrastructures are covering physical site facilities, dedicated instrumentation and e-infrastructure. The LifeWatch infrastructure for biodiversity and ecosystem research will provide services for data integration, analysis and modeling. But it has to cooperate intensively with the other kinds of infrastructures in order to support the iteration between data production and model computation. The cooperation in the ENVRI project (Common operations of environmental research infrastructures) is one of the initiatives to foster such multidisciplinary research.

NIST Document Sharing Test Facility

Science.gov Websites

NIST Document Sharing Test Facility This site supports the IHE effort in Document Sharing as part . This test facility is based on the IHE IT Infrastructure Technical Framework. All testing done against that Patient IDs be pre-registered before submitting metadata about them. To allocate new patient IDs

Education Facilities Sector-Specific Plan: An Annex to the Government Facilities Sector-Specific Plan

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

US Department of Homeland Security, 2010

2010-01-01

Critical infrastructure and key resources (CIKR) provide the essential services that support basic elements of American society. Compromise of these CIKR could disrupt key government and industry activities, facilities, and systems, producing cascading effects throughout the Nation's economy and society and profoundly affecting the national…

Outreach on a National Scale: The Critical Role of Facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bartel, B. A.; Charlevoix, D. J.

2015-12-01

Facilities provide infrastructure for science that would not be feasible at a single institution. Facilities are also a resource for development of outreach products and activities that reach a national audience of diverse stakeholders. UNAVCO manages the NSF geodetic facility GAGE (Geodesy Advancing Geosciences and Earthscope). Staff at UNAVCO with expertise in education, outreach, and communication translate the science and supporting infrastructure into materials consumable by a wide array of users including teachers, students, museum attendees, emergency managers, park interpreters, and members of the general public. UNAVCO has the ability to distribute materials to a national and international audience, thereby greatly increasing the impact of the science and increasing the value of the investment by the National Science Foundation. In 2014 and 2015, UNAVCO produced multiple print products focused on the Plate Boundary Observatory (PBO), the geodetic component of EarthScope. Products include a deck of playing cards featuring PBO GPS stations, a poster featuring GPS velocities of the Western United States, and another poster focused on GPS velocities in Alaska. We are distributing these products to a broad audience, including teachers, station permit holders, and community members. The Tectonics of the Western United States poster was distributed this year in the American Geosciences Institute Earth Science Week kit for teachers, reaching 16,000 educators around the country. These posters and the PBO playing cards (PBO-52) were distributed to more than 100 teachers through workshops led by UNAVCO, the EarthScope National Office, the Southern California Earthquake Center (SCEC), and more. Additionally, these cards serve as a way to engage landowners who host these scientific stations on their property. This presentation will address the strategies for creating nationally relevant materials and the tools used for dissemination of materials to a broad audience. We will outline the process of our planning strategy as well as share ways in which we evaluate impact of particular outreach products and the overall outreach program.

Software and cyber-infrastructure development to control the Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre (OAJ)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yanes-Díaz, A.; Antón, J. L.; Rueda-Teruel, S.; Guillén-Civera, L.; Bello, R.; Jiménez-Mejías, D.; Chueca, S.; Lasso-Cabrera, N. M.; Suárez, O.; Rueda-Teruel, F.; Cenarro, A. J.; Cristobal-Hornillos, D.; Marin-Franch, A.; Luis-Simoes, R.; López-Alegre, G.; Rodríguez-Hernández, M. A. C.; Moles, M.; Ederoclite, A.; Varela, J.; Vazquez Ramió, H.; Díaz-Martín, M. C.; Iglesias-Marzoa, R.; Maicas, N.; Lamadrid, J. L.; Lopez-Sainz, A.; Hernández-Fuertes, J.; Valdivielso, L.; Mendes de Oliveira, C.; Penteado, P.; Schoenell, W.; Kanaan, A.

2014-07-01

The Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre (OAJ) is a new astronomical facility located at the Sierra de Javalambre (Teruel, Spain) whose primary role will be to conduct all-sky astronomical surveys with two unprecedented telescopes of unusually large fields of view: the JST/T250, a 2.55m telescope of 3deg field of view, and the JAST/T80, an 83cm telescope of 2deg field of view. CEFCA engineering team has been designing the OAJ control system as a global concept to manage, monitor, control and maintain all the observatory systems including not only astronomical subsystems but also infrastructure and other facilities. In order to provide quality, reliability and efficiency, the OAJ control system (OCS) design is based on CIA (Control Integrated Architecture) and OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) as a key to improve day and night operation processes. The OCS goes from low level hardware layer including IOs connected directly to sensors and actuators deployed around the whole observatory systems, including telescopes and astronomical instrumentation, up to the high level software layer as a tool to perform efficiently observatory operations. We will give an overview of the OAJ control system design and implementation from an engineering point of view, giving details of the design criteria, technology, architecture, standards, functional blocks, model structure, development, deployment, goals, report about the actual status and next steps.

Truckers' parking/rest facility study.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-07-01

This study examined the current state of truck parking and rest area facilities in the Northeast Illinois Region to determine if : and how problems from truck parking affect freight transportation infrastructure, safety, and the regions economy an...

European environmental research infrastructures are going for common 30 years strategy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Asmi, Ari; Konjin, Jacco; Pursula, Antti

2014-05-01

Environmental Research infrastructures are facilities, resources, systems and related services that are used by research communities to conduct top-level research. Environmental research is addressing processes at very different time scales, and supporting research infrastructures must be designed as long-term facilities in order to meet the requirements of continuous environmental observation, measurement and analysis. This longevity makes the environmental research infrastructures ideal structures to support the long-term development in environmental sciences. ENVRI project is a collaborative action of the major European (ESFRI) Environmental Research Infrastructures working towards increased co-operation and interoperability between the infrastructures. One of the key products of the ENVRI project is to combine the long-term plans of the individual infrastructures towards a common strategy, describing the vision and planned actions. The envisaged vision for environmental research infrastructures toward 2030 is to support the holistic understanding of our planet and it's behavior. The development of a 'Standard Model of the Planet' is a common ambition, a challenge to define an environmental standard model; a framework of all interactions within the Earth System, from solid earth to near space. Indeed scientists feel challenged to contribute to a 'Standard Model of the Planet' with data, models, algorithms and discoveries. Understanding the Earth System as an interlinked system requires a systems approach. The Environmental Sciences are rapidly moving to become a one system-level science. Mainly since modern science, engineering and society are increasingly facing complex problems that can only be understood in the context of the full overall system. The strategy of the supporting collaborating research infrastructures is based on developing three key factors for the Environmental Sciences: the technological, the cultural and the human capital. The technological capital development concentrates on improving the capacities to measure, observe, preserve and compute. This requires staff, technologies, sensors, satellites, floats, software to integrate and to do analysis and modeling, including data storage, computing platforms and networks. The cultural capital development addresses issues such as open access to data, rules, licenses, citation agreements, IPR agreements, technologies for machine-machine interaction, workflows, metadata, and RI community on the policy level. Human capital actions are based on anticipated need of specialists, including data scientists and 'generalists' that oversee more than just their own discipline. Developing these, as interrelated services, should help the scientific community to enter innovative and large projects contributing to a 'Standard Model of the Planet'. To achieve the overall goal, ENVRI will publish a set of action items that contains intermediate aims, bigger and smaller steps to work towards the development of the 'Standard Model of the Planet' approach. This timeline of actions can used as reference and 'common denominator' in defining new projects and research programs. Either within the various environmental scientific disciplines or when cooperating among these disciplines or even when outreaching towards other disciplines like social sciences, physics/chemistry, medical/life sciences etc.

Ebola virus disease cases among health care workers not working in Ebola treatment units--Liberia, June-August, 2014.

PubMed

Matanock, Almea; Arwady, M Allison; Ayscue, Patrick; Forrester, Joseph D; Gaddis, Bethany; Hunter, Jennifer C; Monroe, Benjamin; Pillai, Satish K; Reed, Christie; Schafer, Ilana J; Massaquoi, Moses; Dahn, Bernice; De Cock, Kevin M

2014-11-21

West Africa is experiencing the largest Ebola virus disease (Ebola) epidemic in recorded history. Health care workers (HCWs) are at increased risk for Ebola. In Liberia, as of August 14, 2014, a total of 810 cases of Ebola had been reported, including 10 clusters of Ebola cases among HCWs working in facilities that were not Ebola treatment units (non-ETUs). The Liberian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and CDC investigated these clusters by reviewing surveillance data, interviewing county health officials, HCWs, and contact tracers, and visiting health care facilities. Ninety-seven cases of Ebola (12% of the estimated total) were identified among HCWs; 62 HCW cases (64%) were part of 10 distinct clusters in non-ETU health care facilities, primarily hospitals. Early recognition and diagnosis of Ebola in patients who were the likely source of introduction to the HCWs (i.e., source patients) was missed in four clusters. Inconsistent recognition and triage of cases of Ebola, overcrowding, limitations in layout of physical spaces, lack of training in the use of and adequate supply of personal protective equipment (PPE), and limited supervision to ensure consistent adherence to infection control practices all were observed. Improving infection control infrastructure in non-ETUs is essential for protecting HCWs. Since August, the Liberian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare with a consortium of partners have undertaken collaborative efforts to strengthen infection control infrastructure in non-ETU health facilities.

On the Storm Surge and Sea Level Rise Projections for Infrastructure Risk Analysis and Adaptation

EPA Science Inventory

Storm surge can cause coastal hydrology changes, flooding, water quality changes, and even inundation of low-lying terrain. Strong wave actions and disruptive winds can damage water infrastructure and other environmental assets (hazardous and solid waste management facilities, w...

Experimental Validation: Subscale Aircraft Ground Facilities and Integrated Test Capability

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bailey, Roger M.; Hostetler, Robert W., Jr.; Barnes, Kevin N.; Belcastro, Celeste M.; Belcastro, Christine M.

2005-01-01

Experimental testing is an important aspect of validating complex integrated safety critical aircraft technologies. The Airborne Subscale Transport Aircraft Research (AirSTAR) Testbed is being developed at NASA Langley to validate technologies under conditions that cannot be flight validated with full-scale vehicles. The AirSTAR capability comprises a series of flying sub-scale models, associated ground-support equipment, and a base research station at NASA Langley. The subscale model capability utilizes a generic 5.5% scaled transport class vehicle known as the Generic Transport Model (GTM). The AirSTAR Ground Facilities encompass the hardware and software infrastructure necessary to provide comprehensive support services for the GTM testbed. The ground facilities support remote piloting of the GTM aircraft, and include all subsystems required for data/video telemetry, experimental flight control algorithm implementation and evaluation, GTM simulation, data recording/archiving, and audio communications. The ground facilities include a self-contained, motorized vehicle serving as a mobile research command/operations center, capable of deployment to remote sites when conducting GTM flight experiments. The ground facilities also include a laboratory based at NASA LaRC providing near identical capabilities as the mobile command/operations center, as well as the capability to receive data/video/audio from, and send data/audio to the mobile command/operations center during GTM flight experiments.

Online & Offline data storage and data processing at the European XFEL facility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gasthuber, Martin; Dietrich, Stefan; Malka, Janusz; Kuhn, Manuela; Ensslin, Uwe; Wrona, Krzysztof; Szuba, Janusz

2017-10-01

For the upcoming experiments at the European XFEL light source facility, a new online and offline data processing and storage infrastructure is currently being built and verified. Based on the experience of the system being developed for the Petra III light source at DESY, presented at the last CHEP conference, we further develop the system to cope with the much higher volumes and rates ( 50GB/sec) together with a more complex data analysis and infrastructure conditions (i.e. long range InfiniBand connections). This work will be carried out in collaboration of DESY/IT, European XFEL and technology support from IBM/Research. This presentation will shortly wrap up the experience of 1 year runtime of the PetraIII ([3]) system, continue with a short description of the challenges for the European XFEL ([2]) experiments and the main section, showing the proposed system for online and offline with initial result from real implementation (HW & SW). This will cover the selected cluster filesystem GPFS ([5]) including Quality of Service (QOS), extensive use of flash based subsystems and other new and unique features this architecture will benefit from.

Using infrastructure optimization to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from oil sands extraction and processing.

PubMed

Middleton, Richard S; Brandt, Adam R

2013-02-05

The Alberta oil sands are a significant source of oil production and greenhouse gas emissions, and their importance will grow as the region is poised for decades of growth. We present an integrated framework that simultaneously considers economic and engineering decisions for the capture, transport, and storage of oil sands CO(2) emissions. The model optimizes CO(2) management infrastructure at a variety of carbon prices for the oil sands industry. Our study reveals several key findings. We find that the oil sands industry lends itself well to development of CO(2) trunk lines due to geographic coincidence of sources and sinks. This reduces the relative importance of transport costs compared to nonintegrated transport systems. Also, the amount of managed oil sands CO(2) emissions, and therefore the CCS infrastructure, is very sensitive to the carbon price; significant capture and storage occurs only above 110$/tonne CO(2) in our simulations. Deployment of infrastructure is also sensitive to CO(2) capture decisions and technology, particularly the fraction of capturable CO(2) from oil sands upgrading and steam generation facilities. The framework will help stakeholders and policy makers understand how CCS infrastructure, including an extensive pipeline system, can be safely and cost-effectively deployed.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

MATALUCCI,RUDOLPH V.; O'CONNOR,SHARON

The mission of the Architectural Surety{trademark} program at Sandia National Laboratories is to assure the performance of buildings, facilities, and other infrastructure systems under normal, abnormal, and malevolent threat conditions. Through educational outreach efforts in the classroom, at conferences, and presentations such as this one, public and professional awareness of the need to defuse and mitigate such threats is increased. Buildings, airports, utilities, and other kinds of infrastructure deteriorate over time, as evidenced most dramatically by the crumbling cities and aging buildings, bridges, and other facility systems. Natural disasters such as tornadoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, and flooding also stress the materialsmore » and structural elements of the built environment. In addition, criminals, vandals, and terrorists attack federal buildings, dams, bridges, tunnels, and other public and private facilities. Engineers and architects are beginning to systematically consider these threats during the design, construction, and retrofit phases of buildings and infrastructures and are recommending advanced research in new materials and techniques. Existing building codes and standards do not adequately address nor protect the infrastructure or the public from many of these emerging threats. The activities in Sandia National Laboratories' Architectural Surety{trademark} efforts take a risk management approach to enhancing the safety, security, and reliability of the constructed environment. The technologies and techniques developed during Sandia's 50 years as the nation's lead laboratory for nuclear weapons surety are now being applied to assessing and reducing the vulnerability of dams, to enhancing the safety and security of staff in foreign embassies, and assuring the reliability of other federal facilities. High consequence surety engineering and design brings together technological advancements, new material requirements, systems integration, and risk management to improve the safety, security, and reliability of the as-built environment. The thrust of this paper is the role that new materials can play in protecting the infrastructure. Retrofits of existing buildings, innovative approaches to the design and construction of new facilities, and the mitigation of consequences in the event of an unpreventable disaster are some of the areas that new construction materials can benefit the Architectural Surety{trademark} of the constructed environment.« less

Research and Development, Technology Requirements, and Use of Existing Space Assets

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grey, Jerry; Rowell, Larry

1999-01-01

Technology requirements are addressed in three categories: (1) Passenger-carrying STS(s); (2) orbital facilities (including on-orbit operations such as servicing) and human factors (crew and passenger training and recreation, on-orbit environmental control, etc.); and (3) ground infrastructure. An example tourism trip scenario is used in discussing possible targets for technology development activities. Some general comments are made as are considerations for other working groups.

2001 Mars Odyssey Mission

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Varghese, Philip

2008-01-01

This viewgraph presentation reviews the 2001 Mars Odyssey Mission. The contents include: 1) Mission Overview; 2) Current Scope of Work: 3) Facilities; 4) Critical Role of DSN; 5) Relay as Mission Supplement; 6) Current Mars Telecom Infrastructure; 7) PHX EDL Comm Overview; 8) EDL Geometry (Entry through Landing); 9) Phoenix Support; 10) Preparations for Phoenix; 11) EDL Support Timeline; 12) One Year Rolling Schedule; 13) E3 Rationale; and 14) Spacecraft Status.

Multicenter Cell Processing for Cardiovascular Regenerative Medicine Applications - The Cardiovascular Cell Therapy Research Network (CCTRN) Experience

PubMed Central

Gee, Adrian P.; Richman, Sara; Durett, April; McKenna, David; Traverse, Jay; Henry, Timothy; Fisk, Diann; Pepine, Carl; Bloom, Jeannette; Willerson, James; Prater, Karen; Zhao, David; Koç, Jane Reese; Ellis, Steven; Taylor, Doris; Cogle, Christopher; Moyé, Lemuel; Simari, Robert; Skarlatos, Sonia

2013-01-01

Background Aims Multi-center cellular therapy clinical trials require the establishment and implementation of standardized cell processing protocols and associated quality control mechanisms. The aims here were to develop such an infrastructure in support of the Cardiovascular Cell Therapy Research Network (CCTRN) and to report on the results of processing for the first 60 patients. Methods Standardized cell preparations, consisting of autologous bone marrow mononuclear cells, prepared using the Sepax device were manufactured at each of the five processing facilities that supported the clinical treatment centers. Processing staff underwent centralized training that included proficiency evaluation. Quality was subsequently monitored by a central quality control program that included product evaluation by the CCTRN biorepositories. Results Data from the first 60 procedures demonstrate that uniform products, that met all release criteria, could be manufactured at all five sites within 7 hours of receipt of the bone marrow. Uniformity was facilitated by use of the automated systems (the Sepax for processing and the Endosafe device for endotoxin testing), standardized procedures and centralized quality control. Conclusions Complex multicenter cell therapy and regenerative medicine protocols can, where necessary, successfully utilize local processing facilities once an effective infrastructure is in place to provide training, and quality control. PMID:20524773

Europlanet Research Infrastructure: Planetary Sample Analysis Facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cloquet, C.; Mason, N. J.; Davies, G. R.; Marty, B.

2008-09-01

EuroPlanet The Europlanet Research Infrastructure consortium funded under FP7 aims to provide the EU Planetary Science community greater access for to research infrastructure. A series of networking and outreach initiatives will be complimented by joint research activities and the formation of three Trans National Access distributed service laboratories (TNA's) to provide a unique and comprehensive set of analogue field sites, laboratory simulation facilities, and extraterrestrial sample analysis tools. Here we report on the infrastructure that comprises the third TNA: Planetary Sample Analysis Facilities. The modular infrastructure represents a major commitment of analytical instrumentation by three institutes and together forms a state-of-the-art analytical facility of unprecedented breadth. These centres perform research in the fields of geochemistry and cosmochemistry, studying fluids and rocks in order to better understand the keys cof the universe. Europlanet Research Infrastructure Facilities: Ion Probe facilities at CRPG and OU The Cameca 1270 Ion microprobe is a CNRS-INSU national facility. About a third of the useful analytical time of the ion probe (about 3 months each year) is allocated to the national community. French scientists have to submit their projects to a national committee for selection. The selected projects are allocated time in the following 6 months twice a year. About 15 to 20 projects are run each year. There are only two such instruments in Europe, with cosmochemistry only performed at CRPG. Different analyses can be performed on a routine basis, such as U-Pb dating on Zircon, Monazite or Pechblende, Li, B, C, O, Si isotopic ratios determination on different matrix, 26Al, 60Fe extinct radioactivity ages, light and trace elements contents . The NanoSIMS 50L - producing element or isotope maps with a spatial resolution down to ≈50nm. This is one of the cornerstone facilities of UKCAN, with 75% of available instrument time funded and committed to UK cosmochemical activity - but the remainder is free for other applications and users. The UK activity is managed by the UKCAN management committee and vetted through a local working group. Management of the remaining 25% of other activity will be organised through the local working group. This is the newest, and most advanced of three instruments of this type in Europe which routinely address cosmochemical analyses. The instrument is capable of providing high spatial resolution (down to 50nm) elemental and isotope distribution maps for a wide range of elements from across the periodic table. It is also capable of high precision (per mil) isotopic spot measurements with a spatial resolution of a few microns for a range of elements including C, N, O, S, Si, Mg, etc. Noble Gases facilities at CRPG and OU Ar/Ar Nu Instruments Noblesse is coupled with an ultra-low volume extraction line and with a choice of 213 nm UV laser or 1090 nm IR lasers, providing a wide range of analytical capability in Ar/Ar dating of lunar and meteorite samples. This instrument is unique with a mass resolution of 3000, and with the UV laser it has the capability to measure Ar isotope variation on a ca. 30 -micron resolution enabling detailed mapping of age and apparent age variation within minerals. The 1090 nm laser provides the capability to step-heat small samples. The laboratory is fully supported by sample preparation facilities and technical expertise in lunar and meteorite Ar/Ar analysis. Helium isotope facility. Analysis of the isotopes of helium in rocks and minerals. Determining the origin of gases in meteorites and ET return samples, dating surface exposure with cosmogenic 3He using the latest He isotope mass spectrometer, the GV Helix SFT, the first instrument installed in Europe. CRPG is an European leader in this domain. Non-Traditional stable Isotopes and radiogenic isotopes at VUA and CRPG The specific facility proposed for the TNA is the geochemistry labs used for the study of long (e.g. Rb- Sr, Sm-Nd…) and short-lived radioisotope (e.g. Mg- Al, Hf-W..), including also Os isotopes, stable and non traditional stable isotope facilities (e.g. Fe, Pb, Zn…). The facility comprises three multicollector Thermal ionization mass spectrometers (TIMS) and two multi-collector ICP-MS one of which is fitted with 193 nm laser for in situ work. In addition these instruments are fully supported by sample preparation labs (crushing, mineral separation/picking), a clean lab and geochemical support (XRF; ICP; ICP-MS etc). Data that can be obtained on samples containing sub nano gram to nanogram amounts. Organic matter analysis at OU Leco Pegasus IV GCxGC-TOFMS - mass spectrometric complete characterisation of very complex mixtures of organic materials. The Pegasus EPSC Abstracts, Vol. 3, EPSC2008-A-00437, 2008 European Planetary Science Congress, Author(s) 2008 4D GCxGC-TOFMS system, from Leco, provides the analyst with four dimensions of analytical resolution for significantly more complete sample analysis compared to conventional GC-Mass Spectrometry. The main advantages include: 1) The significantly increased sensitivity over the whole mass range (5- 1000 amu); 2)The separation of compounds that coelute on standard gas chromatograph systems; 3) Separation of analytes by volatility and polarity enables traditionally unresolved mixtures to be examined in detail, and vastly increases the number of compounds identified; 4) Greatly increased signal to noise ratio, due to compounds being separated from the column bleed of the first column on the second GC column and an enormous increase in the Spectral Generation Rate. A number of different pyrolysis and injection sample introduction facilities are available and access to off-line data processing and reference libraries. This is the only instrument of this type in a European laboratory with a significant focus on extraterrestrial materials. Thermo MAT 253 GC-IRMS -isotopic measurements of H, C or N on individual organic compounds in complex mixtures. One of only a few instruments of this type worldwide primarily dedicated to the analysis of extra-terrestrial materials. Supported by fully equipped sample preparation laboratories and GC-Mass Spectrometers required to develop the exact methodology necessary for optimal analysis of each sample. A number of different sample introduction injection and pyrolysis systems are available. Open University is one of the leading laboratories in the world for compound specific isotopic measurements of extra-terrestrial organics and this is one of a very few instruments of this type in the world largely dedicated to extra-terrestrial materials. Conclusion Currently planetary research is limited to meteorites and lunar samples but future return missions will provide enough material from comets and asteroids. A major focus of research in the next 5-10 years will be comparative planetology to understand the types of geochemical processes that can be expected on the (former) water rich regions of Mars to be sure that the detection of past life is unambiguous. The aim of this infrastructure is to provide a structured access to state of the art analytical facilities for European users.

Adequate & Equitable U.S. PK-12 Infrastructure: Priority Actions for Systemic Reform. A Report from the Planning for PK-12 School Infrastructure National Initiative

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Filardo, Mary; Vincent, Jeffrey M.

2017-01-01

To formulate a "systems-based" plan to address the PK-12 infrastructure crisis, in 2016, the 21st Century School Fund (21CSF) and the University of California-Berkeley's Center for Cities + Schools (CC+S), in partnership with the National Council on School Facilities and the Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council,…

Formation and maintenance of the territorial balance in the conditions of high-rise construction in the city

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kisel, Tatiana

2018-03-01

High-rise construction results in the need of planning of infrastructure facilities, taking into account the increase in loading, as high-rise construction allows to place considerably bigger number of residents in the limited territory. For this purpose it is necessary to estimate the required and actual level of providing the population with each particular type of the facilities of social infrastructure. The compliance of required and actual level of providing can be characterized as the territorial balance, while the discrepancy acts as the territorial imbalance. The article is devoted to the development of such instruments of planning of urban development, which will allow to create the qualitative urban environment, founded on the territorial balances. Namely, it is devoted to the calculation of level of providing the population with the facilities of social infrastructure, to the determination of level of the imbalance in absolute and relative units and also to the ranging of imbalances on urgency of their elimination. The size of the imbalance is of great importance for planning and realization of managerial influences from the executive authorities, operating the city development. In order to determine the urgency of realization of actions for the construction of facilities of social infrastructure it is offered to range the imbalances according to their size, having determined the deviation size from balance, which is so insignificant that it does not demand any managerial influences (it can be characterized as balance) and also the groups of the imbalances, differing in urgency of managerial influences, directed to the decrease and elimination of the revealed imbalance.

A hydrologic retention system and water quality monitoring program for a human decomposition research facility: concept and design.

PubMed

Wozniak, Jeffrey R; Thies, Monte L; Bytheway, Joan A; Lutterschmidt, William I

2015-01-01

Forensic taphonomy is an essential research field; however, the decomposition of human cadavers at forensic science facilities may lead to nutrient loading and the introduction of unique biological compounds to adjacent areas. The infrastructure of a water retention system may provide a mechanism for the biogeochemical processing and retention of nutrients and compounds, ensuring the control of runoff from forensic facilities. This work provides a proof of concept for a hydrologic retention system and an autonomous water quality monitoring program designed to mitigate runoff from The Southeast Texas Applied Forensic Science (STAFS) Facility. Water samples collected along a sample transect were analyzed for total phosphorous, total nitrogen, NO3-, NO2-, NH4, F(-), and Cl(-). Preliminary water quality analyses confirm the overall effectiveness of the water retention system. These results are discussed with relation to how this infrastructure can be expanded upon to monitor additional, more novel, byproducts of forensic science research facilities. © 2014 American Academy of Forensic Sciences.

Investigation into the effect of infrastructure on fly-in fly-out mining workers.

PubMed

Perring, Adam; Pham, Kieu; Snow, Steve; Buys, Laurie

2014-12-01

To explore fly-in fly-out (FIFO) mining workers' attitudes towards the leisure time they spend in mining camps, the recreational and social aspects of mining camp culture, the camps' communal and recreational infrastructure and activities, and implications for health. In-depth semistructured interviews. Individual interviews at locations convenient for each participant. A total of seven participants, one female and six males. The age group varied within 20-59 years. Marital status varied across participants. A qualitative approach was used to interview participants, with responses thematically analysed. Findings highlight how the recreational infrastructure and activities at mining camps impact participants' enjoyment of the camps and their feelings of community and social inclusion. Three main areas of need were identified in the interviews, as follows: (i) on-site facilities and activities; (ii) the role of infrastructure in facilitating a sense of community; and (iii) barriers to social interaction. Recreational infrastructure and activities enhance the experience of FIFO workers at mining camps. The availability of quality recreational facilities helps promote social interaction, provides for greater social inclusion and improves the experience of mining camps for their temporary FIFO residents. The infrastructure also needs to allow for privacy and individual recreational activities, which participants identified as important emotional needs. Developing appropriate recreational infrastructure at mining camps would enhance social interactions among FIFO workers, improve their well-being and foster a sense of community. Introducing infrastructure to promote social and recreational activities could also reduce alcohol-related social exclusion. © 2014 National Rural Health Alliance Inc.

XML Based Scientific Data Management Facility

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mehrotra, Piyush; Zubair, M.; Ziebartt, John (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The World Wide Web consortium has developed an Extensible Markup Language (XML) to support the building of better information management infrastructures. The scientific computing community realizing the benefits of HTML has designed markup languages for scientific data. In this paper, we propose a XML based scientific data management facility, XDMF. The project is motivated by the fact that even though a lot of scientific data is being generated, it is not being shared because of lack of standards and infrastructure support for discovering and transforming the data. The proposed data management facility can be used to discover the scientific data itself, the transformation functions, and also for applying the required transformations. We have built a prototype system of the proposed data management facility that can work on different platforms. We have implemented the system using Java, and Apache XSLT engine Xalan. To support remote data and transformation functions, we had to extend the XSLT specification and the Xalan package.

XML Based Scientific Data Management Facility

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mehrotra, P.; Zubair, M.; Bushnell, Dennis M. (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

The World Wide Web consortium has developed an Extensible Markup Language (XML) to support the building of better information management infrastructures. The scientific computing community realizing the benefits of XML has designed markup languages for scientific data. In this paper, we propose a XML based scientific data management ,facility, XDMF. The project is motivated by the fact that even though a lot of scientific data is being generated, it is not being shared because of lack of standards and infrastructure support for discovering and transforming the data. The proposed data management facility can be used to discover the scientific data itself, the transformation functions, and also for applying the required transformations. We have built a prototype system of the proposed data management facility that can work on different platforms. We have implemented the system using Java, and Apache XSLT engine Xalan. To support remote data and transformation functions, we had to extend the XSLT specification and the Xalan package.

Outsourcing strategy and tendering methodology for the operation and maintenance of CERN’s cryogenic facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Serio, L.; Bremer, J.; Claudet, S.; Delikaris, D.; Ferlin, G.; Ferrand, F.; Pezzetti, M.; Pirotte, O.

2017-12-01

CERN operates and maintains the world largest cryogenic infrastructure ranging from ageing but well maintained installations feeding detectors, test facilities and general services, to the state-of-the-art cryogenic system serving the flagship LHC machine complex. A study was conducted and a methodology proposed to outsource to industry the operation and maintenance of the whole cryogenic infrastructure. The cryogenic installations coupled to non LHC-detectors, test facilities and general services infrastructure have been fully outsourced for operation and maintenance on the basis of performance obligations. The contractor is responsible for the operational performance of the installations based on a yearly operation schedule provided by CERN. The maintenance of the cryogenic system serving the LHC machine and its detectors has been outsourced on the basis of tasks oriented obligations, monitored by key performance indicators. CERN operation team, with the support of the contractor operation team, remains responsible for the operational strategy and performances. We report the analysis, strategy, definition of the requirements and technical specifications as well as the achieved technical and economic performances after one year of operation.

When Money Matters: School Infrastructure Funding and Student Achievement

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crampton, Faith E.; Thompson, David C.

2011-01-01

Today's school business officials are more aware than ever of the importance of making every dollar count. As they scour their budgets for possible savings, they may be tempted to reduce investment in school infrastructure, perhaps by deferring maintenance, renovations, and replacement of outdated facilities. However, school business officials…

Elemental Concentrations in Urban Green Stormwater Infrastructure Soils

Treesearch

Michelle C. Kondo; Raghav Sharma; Alain F. Plante; Yunwen Yang; Igor Burstyn

2016-01-01

Green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) is designed to capture stormwater for infiltration, detention, evapotranspiration, or reuse. Soils play a key role in stormwater interception at these facilities. It is important to assess whether contamination is occurring in GSI soils because urban stormwater drainage areas often accumulate elements of concern. Soil contamination...

77 FR 74685 - Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) Chemical-Terrorism Vulnerability Information...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-12-17

... Programs Directorate (NPPD), Office of Infrastructure Protection (IP), Infrastructure Security Compliance... questions about this Information Collection Request should be forwarded to DHS/NPPD/IP/ISCD CFATS Program... to the DHS/NPPD/IP/ISCD CFATS Program Manager at the Department of Homeland Security, 245 Murray Lane...

School Facilities: America's Schools Not Designed or Equipped for 21st Century. Report to Congressional Requesters.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

General Accounting Office, Washington, DC. Health, Education, and Human Services Div.

This document presents findings of a General Accounting Office study that examined the extent to which America's schools have the physical capacity to support learning into the 21st century. Specifically, it looked at facilities requirements, environmental conditions, educational technologies, and facility infrastructure. Data were collected…

Life-cycle implications and supply chain logistics of electric vehicle battery recycling in California

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hendrickson, Thomas P.; Kavvada, Olga; Shah, Nihar; Sathre, Roger; Scown, Corinne D.

2015-01-01

Plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) use in the United States (US) has doubled in recent years and is projected to continue increasing rapidly. This is especially true in California, which makes up nearly one-third of the current US PEV market. Planning and constructing the necessary infrastructure to support this projected increase requires insight into the optimal strategies for PEV battery recycling. Utilizing life-cycle perspectives in evaluating these supply chain networks is essential in fully understanding the environmental consequences of this infrastructure expansion. This study combined life-cycle assessment and geographic information systems (GIS) to analyze the energy, greenhouse gas (GHG), water use, and criteria air pollutant implications of end-of-life infrastructure networks for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) in California. Multiple end-of-life scenarios were assessed, including hydrometallurgical and pyrometallurgical recycling processes. Using economic and environmental criteria, GIS modeling revealed optimal locations for battery dismantling and recycling facilities for in-state and out-of-state recycling scenarios. Results show that economic return on investment is likely to diminish if more than two in-state dismantling facilities are constructed. Using rail as well as truck transportation can substantially reduce transportation-related GHG emissions (23-45%) for both in-state and out-of-state recycling scenarios. The results revealed that material recovery from pyrometallurgy can offset environmental burdens associated with LIB production, namely a 6-56% reduction in primary energy demand and 23% reduction in GHG emissions, when compared to virgin production. Incorporating human health damages from air emissions into the model indicated that Los Angeles and Kern Counties are most at risk in the infrastructure scale-up for in-state recycling due to their population density and proximity to the optimal location.

Quantifying habitat impacts of natural gas infrastructure to facilitate biodiversity offsetting

PubMed Central

Jones, Isabel L; Bull, Joseph W; Milner-Gulland, Eleanor J; Esipov, Alexander V; Suttle, Kenwyn B

2014-01-01

Habitat degradation through anthropogenic development is a key driver of biodiversity loss. One way to compensate losses is “biodiversity offsetting” (wherein biodiversity impacted is “replaced” through restoration elsewhere). A challenge in implementing offsets, which has received scant attention in the literature, is the accurate determination of residual biodiversity losses. We explore this challenge for offsetting gas extraction in the Ustyurt Plateau, Uzbekistan. Our goal was to determine the landscape extent of habitat impacts, particularly how the footprint of “linear” infrastructure (i.e. roads, pipelines), often disregarded in compensation calculations, compares with “hub” infrastructure (i.e. extraction facilities). We measured vegetation cover and plant species richness using the line-intercept method, along transects running from infrastructure/control sites outward for 500 m, accounting for wind direction to identify dust deposition impacts. Findings from 24 transects were extrapolated to the broader plateau by mapping total landscape infrastructure network using GPS data and satellite imagery. Vegetation cover and species richness were significantly lower at development sites than controls. These differences disappeared within 25 m of the edge of the area physically occupied by infrastructure. The current habitat footprint of gas infrastructure is 220 ± 19 km2 across the Ustyurt (total ∼ 100,000 km2), 37 ± 6% of which is linear infrastructure. Vegetation impacts diminish rapidly with increasing distance from infrastructure, and localized dust deposition does not conspicuously extend the disturbance footprint. Habitat losses from gas extraction infrastructure cover 0.2% of the study area, but this reflects directly eliminated vegetation only. Impacts upon fauna pose a more difficult determination, as these require accounting for behavioral and demographic responses to disturbance by elusive mammals, including threatened species. This study demonstrates that impacts of linear infrastructure in regions such as the Ustyurt should be accounted for not just with respect to development sites but also associated transportation and delivery routes. PMID:24455163

Quantifying habitat impacts of natural gas infrastructure to facilitate biodiversity offsetting.

PubMed

Jones, Isabel L; Bull, Joseph W; Milner-Gulland, Eleanor J; Esipov, Alexander V; Suttle, Kenwyn B

2014-01-01

Habitat degradation through anthropogenic development is a key driver of biodiversity loss. One way to compensate losses is "biodiversity offsetting" (wherein biodiversity impacted is "replaced" through restoration elsewhere). A challenge in implementing offsets, which has received scant attention in the literature, is the accurate determination of residual biodiversity losses. We explore this challenge for offsetting gas extraction in the Ustyurt Plateau, Uzbekistan. Our goal was to determine the landscape extent of habitat impacts, particularly how the footprint of "linear" infrastructure (i.e. roads, pipelines), often disregarded in compensation calculations, compares with "hub" infrastructure (i.e. extraction facilities). We measured vegetation cover and plant species richness using the line-intercept method, along transects running from infrastructure/control sites outward for 500 m, accounting for wind direction to identify dust deposition impacts. Findings from 24 transects were extrapolated to the broader plateau by mapping total landscape infrastructure network using GPS data and satellite imagery. Vegetation cover and species richness were significantly lower at development sites than controls. These differences disappeared within 25 m of the edge of the area physically occupied by infrastructure. The current habitat footprint of gas infrastructure is 220 ± 19 km(2) across the Ustyurt (total ∼ 100,000 km(2)), 37 ± 6% of which is linear infrastructure. Vegetation impacts diminish rapidly with increasing distance from infrastructure, and localized dust deposition does not conspicuously extend the disturbance footprint. Habitat losses from gas extraction infrastructure cover 0.2% of the study area, but this reflects directly eliminated vegetation only. Impacts upon fauna pose a more difficult determination, as these require accounting for behavioral and demographic responses to disturbance by elusive mammals, including threatened species. This study demonstrates that impacts of linear infrastructure in regions such as the Ustyurt should be accounted for not just with respect to development sites but also associated transportation and delivery routes.

A qualitative evaluation of the choice of traditional birth attendants for maternity care in 2008 Sierra Leone: implications for universal skilled attendance at delivery.

PubMed

Oyerinde, Koyejo; Harding, Yvonne; Amara, Philip; Garbrah-Aidoo, Nana; Kanu, Rugiatu; Oulare, Macoura; Shoo, Rumishael; Daoh, Kizito

2013-07-01

Maternal and newborn death is common in Sierra Leone; significant reductions in both maternal and newborn mortality require universal access to a skilled attendant during labor and delivery. When too few women use health facilities MDGs 4 and 5 targets will not be met. Our objectives were to identify why women use services provided by TBAs as compared to health facilities; and to suggest strategies to improve utilization of health facilities for maternity and newborn care services. Qualitative data from focus group discussions in communities adjacent to health facilities collected during the 2008 Emergency Obstetric and Newborn Care Needs Assessment were analyzed for themes relating to decision-making on the utilization of TBAs or health facilities. The prohibitive cost of services, and the geographic inaccessibility of health facilities discouraged women from using them while trust in the vast experience of TBAs as well as their compassionate care drew patients to them. Poor facility infrastructure, often absent staff, and the perception that facilities were poorly stocked and could not provide continuum of care services were barriers to facility utilization for maternity and newborn care. Improvements in infrastructure and the 24-hour provision of free, quality, comprehensive, and respectful care will minimize TBA preference in Sierra Leone.

Water Utility Management Strategies in Turkey: The current situation and the challenges

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alp, E.; Aksoy, M. N.; Koçer, B.

2013-12-01

As the effects of climate change becomes more prominent, current challenges related to water and wastewater management is becoming more serious. Providing water that satisfies environmental and safety standards in terms of quantity and quality is needed to maintain human life without compromising the need of future generations. Besides providing safe and affordable water, necessary treatment should be achieved according to several important factors such as receiving body standards, discharge standards, water reuse options. Therefore, management of water becomes more crucial than ever that states have to provide accessibility of safe water with affordable cost to its citizens with the means of effective utility management, including water treatment facilities, wastewater treatment facilities, water supply facilities and water distribution systems. Water utilities encounter with several challenges related to cost, infrastructure, population, legislation, workforce and resource. This study aims to determine the current situation and the necessary strategies to improve utility management in Turkish municipalities in a sustainable manner. US Environment Protection Agency (EPA) has formed a tool on effective utility management that assists utilities to provide a solution for both current and future challenges. In this study, we used EPA's guidelines and developed a survey consists of 60 questions under 10 sub-topics (Product Quality, Employee & Leadership Development, Stakeholder Understanding & Support, Operational Optimization, Infrastructure Stability, Financial Viability, Community Sustainability, Customer Satisfaction, Operational Resiliency, and Water Resource Adequacy). This survey was sent to the managers of 25 metropolitan municipalities in Turkey to assess the current condition of municipalities. After the evaluation of the survey results for each topic, including the importance given by managers, facilities were rated according to their level of achievement. The scores were given for Rate Achievement from 1 to 5 and Rank Importance from 1 to 10 to the survey outcomes for each topic. Then, rating and ranking matrix was constructed according to score ranges. Results show that Product Quality, Stakeholder Understanding & Support, Infrastructure Stability and Customer Satisfaction are the major topics that needs to be improved according to the utility managers in Turkey. According to the outcomes of the study, water losses and unbilled unmetered consumption of water appeared to be the most important issues with the utility management. The utility managers also think there is still room for improvement to satisfy the needs of the users. Even though the rehabilitation of the infrastructure is a costly investment, it can be compensated with the help of the increased revenues as a result of improvement in water loss and unbilled water use. Suggestions given as a result of this study aim to aid decision makers and local authorities to overcome the significant problems faced during management and to achieve a sustainable utility management.

A Proposed Approach for Prioritizing Maintenance at NASA Centers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dunn, Steven C.; Sawyer, Melvin H.

2013-01-01

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) manages a vast array of infrastructure assets across ten National Centers with a worth of at least 30 billion dollars. Eighty percent of this infrastructure is greater than 40 years old and is in degraded condition. Maintenance budgets are typically less than one percent of current replacement value (CRV), much less than the 2-4% recommended by the National Research Council. The maintenance backlog was 2.55 billion dollars in FY10 and growing. NASA s annual budgets have flattened and are at risk of being reduced, so the problem is becoming even more difficult. NASA Centers utilize various means to prioritize and accomplish maintenance within available budgets, though data is suspect and processes are variable. This paper offers a structured means to prioritize maintenance based on mission criticality and facility performance (ability of the facility to deliver on its purpose). Mission alignment is assessed using the current timeframe Mission Dependence Index and a measure of facility alignment with the 2011 NASA Strategic Plan for the long-term perspective. Facility performance is assessed by combining specific findings from a structured facility condition assessment and an assessment of actual functional output. These are then combined in a matrix to identify the facilities most critical to mission and able to deliver services. The purpose of this approach is to provide the best benefits for the available funding. Additionally, this rationale can also be applied to the prioritization of investment (recapitalization) projects so that the ultimate customers of this paper, the senior infrastructure managers at each NASA Center, are better able to strategically manage their capabilities.

Research Plan of the Department of Systems Engineering and the Operations Research Center for the Academic Year 2006

DTIC Science & Technology

2005-09-01

Facilities Layout o Scope problem with client in terms of options for M&S facilities layouts with regards to infrastructure, personnel... Facilities Layout o Develop M&S Installation Facilities Layout Design(s) Requirements and Milestones: • Scope problem with client (systems on which...objectives of this study are to (a) identify the desired technology and facilities layouts which would enhance inter-installation simulation

Medication safety infrastructure in critical-access hospitals in Florida.

PubMed

Winterstein, Almut G; Hartzema, Abraham G; Johns, Thomas E; De Leon, Jessica M; McDonald, Kathie; Henshaw, Zak; Pannell, Robert

2006-03-01

The medication safety infrastructure of critical-access hospitals (CAHs) in Florida was evaluated. Qualitative assessments, including a self-administered survey and site visits, were conducted in seven of nine CAHs between January and June 2003. The survey consisted of the Institute for Safe Medication Practices Medication Safety Self-assessment, the 2003 Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations patient safety goals, health information technology (HIT) questions, and medication-use-process flow charts. On-site visits included interviews of CAH personnel who had safety responsibility and inspections of pharmacy facilities. The findings were compiled into a matrix reflecting structural and procedural components of the CAH medication safety infrastructure. The nine characteristics that emerged as targets for quality improvement (QI) were medication accessibility and storage, sterile product compounding, access to drug information, access to and utilization of patient information in medication order review, advanced safety technology, drug formularies and standardized medication protocols, safety culture, and medication reconciliation. Based on weighted importance and feasibility, QI efforts in CAHs should focus on enhancing medication order review systems, standardizing procedures for handling high-risk medications, promoting an appropriate safety culture, involvement in seamless care, and investment in HIT.

Traffic control for high occupancy vehicle facilities in Virginia.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1998-04-01

High occupancy vehicle (HOV) facilities are an important tool in relieving the congestion that continues to build on many urban roadways. By moving more people in fewer vehicles, the existing infrastructure can be used more efficiently. Operating HOV...

SNL Five-Year Facilities & Infrastructure Plan FY2015-2019

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cipriani, Ralph J.

2014-12-01

Sandia’s development vision is to provide an agile, flexible, safer, more secure, and efficient enterprise that leverages the scientific and technical capabilities of the workforce and supports national security requirements in multiple areas. Sandia’s Five-Year Facilities & Infrastructure Planning program represents a tool to budget and prioritize immediate and short-term actions from indirect funding sources in light of the bigger picture of proposed investments from direct-funded, Work for Others and other funding sources. As a complementary F&I investment program, Sandia’s indirect investment program supports incremental achievement of the development vision within a constrained resource environment.

Environmental engineering of navigation infrastructure: a survey of existing practices, challenges, and potential opportunities.

PubMed

Fredette, Thomas J; Foran, Christy M; Brasfield, Sandra M; Suedel, Burton C

2012-01-01

Navigation infrastructure such as channels, jetties, river training structures, and lock-and-dam facilities are primary components of a safe and efficient water transportation system. Planning for such infrastructure has until recently involved efforts to minimize impacts on the environment through a standardized environmental assessment process. More recently, consistent with environmental sustainability concepts, planners have begun to consider how such projects can also be constructed with environmental enhancements. This study examined the existing institutional conditions within the US Army Corps of Engineers and cooperating federal agencies relative to incorporating environmental enhancements into navigation infrastructure projects. The study sought to (1) investigate institutional attitudes towards the environmental enhancement of navigation infrastructure (EENI) concept, (2) identify potential impediments to implementation and solutions to such impediments, (3) identify existing navigation projects designed with the express intent of enhancing environmental benefit in addition to the primary project purpose, (4) identify innovative ideas for increasing environmental benefits for navigation projects, (5) identify needs for additional technical information or research, and (6) identify laws, regulations, and policies that both support and hinder such design features. The principal investigation tool was an Internet-based survey with 53 questions. The survey captured a wide range of perspectives on the EENI concept including ideas, concerns, research needs, and relevant laws and policies. Study recommendations included further promotion of the concept of EENI to planners and designers, documentation of existing projects, initiation of pilot studies on some of the innovative ideas provided through the survey, and development of national goals and interagency agreements to facilitate implementation. Copyright © 2011 SETAC.

The Use of Spatial Data Infrastructure in Environmental Management:an Example from the Spatial Planning Practice in Poland.

PubMed

Zwirowicz-Rutkowska, Agnieszka; Michalik, Anna

2016-10-01

Today's technology plays a crucial role in the effective use of environmental information. This includes geographic information systems and infrastructures. The purpose of this research is to identify the way in which the Polish spatial data infrastructure (PSDI) supports policies and activities that may have an impact on the environment in relation to one group of users, namely urban planners, and their tasks concerning environmental management. The study is based on a survey conducted in July and August, 2014. Moreover, the authors' expert knowledge gained through urban development practice and the analysis of the environmental conservation regulations and spatial planning in Poland has been used to define the scope of environmental management in both spatial planning studies and spatial data sources. The research included assessment of data availability, infrastructure usability, and its impact on decision-making process. The results showed that the PSDI is valuable because it allows for the acquisition of data on environmental monitoring, agricultural and aquaculture facilities. It also has a positive impact on decision-making processes and improves numerous planners' activities concerning both the inclusion of environmental indicators in spatial plans and the support of nature conservation and environmental management in the process of working on future land use. However, even though the infrastructure solves certain problems with data accessibility, further improvements might be proposed. The importance of the SDI in environmental management is noticeable and could be considered from many standpoints: Data, communities engaged in policy or decision-making concerning environmental issues, and data providers.

CLIMB (the Cloud Infrastructure for Microbial Bioinformatics): an online resource for the medical microbiology community

PubMed Central

Smith, Andy; Southgate, Joel; Poplawski, Radoslaw; Bull, Matthew J.; Richardson, Emily; Ismail, Matthew; Thompson, Simon Elwood-; Kitchen, Christine; Guest, Martyn; Bakke, Marius

2016-01-01

The increasing availability and decreasing cost of high-throughput sequencing has transformed academic medical microbiology, delivering an explosion in available genomes while also driving advances in bioinformatics. However, many microbiologists are unable to exploit the resulting large genomics datasets because they do not have access to relevant computational resources and to an appropriate bioinformatics infrastructure. Here, we present the Cloud Infrastructure for Microbial Bioinformatics (CLIMB) facility, a shared computing infrastructure that has been designed from the ground up to provide an environment where microbiologists can share and reuse methods and data. PMID:28785418

CLIMB (the Cloud Infrastructure for Microbial Bioinformatics): an online resource for the medical microbiology community.

PubMed

Connor, Thomas R; Loman, Nicholas J; Thompson, Simon; Smith, Andy; Southgate, Joel; Poplawski, Radoslaw; Bull, Matthew J; Richardson, Emily; Ismail, Matthew; Thompson, Simon Elwood-; Kitchen, Christine; Guest, Martyn; Bakke, Marius; Sheppard, Samuel K; Pallen, Mark J

2016-09-01

The increasing availability and decreasing cost of high-throughput sequencing has transformed academic medical microbiology, delivering an explosion in available genomes while also driving advances in bioinformatics. However, many microbiologists are unable to exploit the resulting large genomics datasets because they do not have access to relevant computational resources and to an appropriate bioinformatics infrastructure. Here, we present the Cloud Infrastructure for Microbial Bioinformatics (CLIMB) facility, a shared computing infrastructure that has been designed from the ground up to provide an environment where microbiologists can share and reuse methods and data.

Safety Practices Followed in ISRO Launch Complex- An Overview

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Krishnamurty, V.; Srivastava, V. K.; Ramesh, M.

2005-12-01

The spaceport of India, Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), is located at Sriharikota, a spindle shaped island on the east coast of southern India.SDSC SHAR has a unique combination of facilities, such as a solid propellant production plant, a rocket motor static test facility, launch complexes for different types of rockets, telemetry, telecommand, tracking, data acquisition and processing facilities and other support services.The Solid Propellant Space Booster Plant (SPROB) located at SDSC SHAR produces composite solid propellant for rocket motors of ISRO. The main ingredients of the propellant produced here are ammonium perchlorate (oxidizer), fine aluminium powder (fuel) and hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene (binder).SDSC SHAR has facilities for testing solid rocket motors, both at ambient conditions and at simulated high altitude conditions. Other test facilities for the environmental testing of rocket motors and their subsystems include Vibration, Shock, Constant Acceleration and Thermal / Humidity.SDSC SHAR has the necessary infrastructure for launching satellites into low earth orbit, polar orbit and geo-stationary transfer orbit. The launch complexes provide complete support for vehicle assembly, fuelling with both earth storable and cryogenic propellants, checkout and launch operations. Apart from these, it has facilities for launching sounding rockets for studying the Earth's upper atmosphere and for controlled reentry and recovery of ISRO's space capsule reentry missions.Safety plays a major role at SDSC SHAR right from the mission / facility design phase to post launch operations. This paper presents briefly the infrastructure available at SDSC SHAR of ISRO for launching sounding rockets, satellite launch vehicles, controlled reentry missions and the built in safety systems. The range safety methodology followed as a part of the real time mission monitoring is presented. The built in safety systems provided onboard the launch vehicle are automatic shut off the propulsion system based on real time mission performance and a passivation system incorporated in the orbit insertion stage are highlighted.

ARM Mentor Selection Process

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sisterson, D. L.

2015-10-01

The Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program was created in 1989 with funding from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop several highly instrumented ground stations to study cloud formation processes and their influence on radiative transfer. In 2003, the ARM Program became a national scientific user facility, known as the ARM Climate Research Facility. This scientific infrastructure provides for fixed sites, mobile facilities, an aerial facility, and a data archive available for use by scientists worldwide through the ARM Climate Research Facility—a scientific user facility. The ARM Climate Research Facility currently operates more than 300 instrument systems that providemore » ground-based observations of the atmospheric column. To keep ARM at the forefront of climate observations, the ARM infrastructure depends heavily on instrument scientists and engineers, also known as lead mentors. Lead mentors must have an excellent understanding of in situ and remote-sensing instrumentation theory and operation and have comprehensive knowledge of critical scale-dependent atmospheric processes. They must also possess the technical and analytical skills to develop new data retrievals that provide innovative approaches for creating research-quality data sets. The ARM Climate Research Facility is seeking the best overall qualified candidate who can fulfill lead mentor requirements in a timely manner.« less

Golden Eagle mortality at a utility-scale wind energy facility near Palm Springs, California

USGS Publications Warehouse

Lovich, Jeffrey E.

2015-01-01

Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) mortality associated with wind energy turbines and infrastructure is under-reported and weakly substantiated in the published literature. I report two cases of mortality at a utility-scale renewable energy facility near Palm Springs, California. The facility has been in operation since 1984 and included 460 65KW turbines mounted on 24.4 m or 42.7 m lattice-style towers with 8 m rotor diameters. One mortality event involved a juvenile eagle that was struck and killed by a spinning turbine blade on 31 August, 1995. The tower was 24.4 m high. The other involved an immature female that was struck by a spinning blade on another 24.4 m tower on 17 April, 1997 and was later euthanized due to the extent of internal injuries. Other raptor mortalities incidentally observed at the site, and likely attributable to turbines, included three Red-tailed Hawks (Buteo jamaicensis) found near turbines.

Systematic risk assessment methodology for critical infrastructure elements - Oil and Gas subsectors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gheorghiu, A.-D.; Ozunu, A.

2012-04-01

The concern for the protection of critical infrastructure has been rapidly growing in the last few years in Europe. The level of knowledge and preparedness in this field is beginning to develop in a lawfully organized manner, for the identification and designation of critical infrastructure elements of national and European interest. Oil and gas production, refining, treatment, storage and transmission by pipelines facilities, are considered European critical infrastructure sectors, as per Annex I of the Council Directive 2008/114/EC of 8 December 2008 on the identification and designation of European critical infrastructures and the assessment of the need to improve their protection. Besides identifying European and national critical infrastructure elements, member states also need to perform a risk analysis for these infrastructure items, as stated in Annex II of the above mentioned Directive. In the field of risk assessment, there are a series of acknowledged and successfully used methods in the world, but not all hazard identification and assessment methods and techniques are suitable for a given site, situation, or type of hazard. As Theoharidou, M. et al. noted (Theoharidou, M., P. Kotzanikolaou, and D. Gritzalis 2009. Risk-Based Criticality Analysis. In Critical Infrastructure Protection III. Proceedings. Third Annual IFIP WG 11.10 International Conference on Critical Infrastructure Protection. Hanover, New Hampshire, USA, March 23-25, 2009: revised selected papers, edited by C. Palmer and S. Shenoi, 35-49. Berlin: Springer.), despite the wealth of knowledge already created, there is a need for simple, feasible, and standardized criticality analyses. The proposed systematic risk assessment methodology includes three basic steps: the first step (preliminary analysis) includes the identification of hazards (including possible natural hazards) for each installation/section within a given site, followed by a criterial analysis and then a detailed analysis step. The criterial evaluation is used as a ranking system in order to establish the priorities for the detailed risk assessment. This criterial analysis stage is necessary because the total number of installations and sections on a site can be quite large. As not all installations and sections on a site contribute significantly to the risk of a major accident occurring, it is not efficient to include all installations and sections in the detailed risk assessment, which can be time and resource consuming. The selected installations are then taken into consideration in the detailed risk assessment, which is the third step of the systematic risk assessment methodology. Following this step, conclusions can be drawn related to the overall risk characteristics of the site. The proposed methodology can as such be successfully applied to the assessment of risk related to critical infrastructure elements falling under the energy sector of Critical Infrastructure, mainly the sub-sectors oil and gas. Key words: Systematic risk assessment, criterial analysis, energy sector critical infrastructure elements

Membrane Lipids as Indicators for Viable Bacterial Communities Inhabiting Petroleum Systems.

PubMed

Gruner, Andrea; Mangelsdorf, Kai; Vieth-Hillebrand, Andrea; Horsfield, Brian; van der Kraan, Geert M; Köhler, Thomas; Janka, Christoph; Morris, Brandon E L; Wilkes, Heinz

2017-08-01

Microbial activity in petroleum reservoirs has been implicated in a suite of detrimental effects including deterioration of petroleum quality, increases in oil sulfur content, biofouling of steel pipelines and other infrastructures, and well plugging. Here, we present a biogeochemical approach, using phospholipid fatty acids (PLFAs), for detecting viable bacteria in petroleum systems. Variations within the bacterial community along water flow paths (producing well, topside facilities, and injection well) can be elucidated in the field using the same technique, as shown here within oil production plants in the Molasse Basin of Upper Austria. The abundance of PLFAs is compared to total cellular numbers, as detected by qPCR of the 16S rDNA gene, to give an overall comparison between the resolutions of both methods in a true field setting. Additionally, the influence of biocide applications on lipid- and DNA-based quantification was investigated. The first oil field, Trattnach, showed significant PLFA abundances and cell numbers within the reservoir and topside facilities. In contrast, the second field (Engenfeld) showed very low PLFA levels overall, likely due to continuous treatment of the topside facilities with a glutaraldehyde-based antimicrobial. In comparison, Trattnach is dosed once per week in a batch fashion. Changes within PLFA compositions across the flow path, throughout the petroleum production plants, point to cellular adaptation within the system and may be linked to shifts in the dominance of certain bacterial types in oil reservoirs versus topside facilities. Overall, PLFA-based monitoring provides a useful tool to assess the abundance and high-level taxonomic diversity of viable microbial populations in oil production wells, topside infrastructure, pipelines, and other related facilities.

Defense Infrastructure: DOD Can Improve Its Response to Environmental Exposures on Military Installations

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-05-01

basis, based on what they perceive the health threat to be. The sidebar illustrates DOD’s response to the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi disaster in Japan... disasters or nuclear attacks, to protect installations, facilities, and personnel—including military and civilian personnel, dependents of military and...4302. Respondents should be aware that notwithstanding any other provision of law, no person shall be subject to a penalty for failing to comply with

Energy - Sandia National Laboratories

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Earth Science - Sandia Energy

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Stationary Power - Sandia Energy

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Transportation Energy - Sandia Energy

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Grid Modernization - Sandia Energy

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Fabulous Facilities: New Constructions and Renovations.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

American Libraries, 1997

1997-01-01

Renovation and construction projects in 18 public and academic libraries across the United States are showcased, with 23 photographs illustrating library interiors and exteriors. Discussion centers on architecture, costs, technology infrastructure and equipment, preservation of old facilities, furniture, and library functions. (AEF)

Hydrogen and Storage Initiatives at the NASA JSC White Sands Test Facility

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Maes, Miguel; Woods, Stephen S.

2006-01-01

NASA WSTF Hydrogen Activities: a) Aerospace Test; b) System Certification & Verification; c) Component, System, & Facility Hazard Assessment; d) Safety Training Technical Transfer: a) Development of Voluntary Consensus Standards and Practices; b) Support of National Hydrogen Infrastructure Development.

Guidelines for Technology Infrastructure in Connecticut Schools: An Implementation Guide for the Connecticut Statewide Educational Technology Plan.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Center for Educational Leadership and Technology, Inc., Marlborough, MA.

This document presents guidelines and recommendations for development of a technology infrastructure in Connecticut public schools that conforms to national industry standards for voice, video, and data communications. The guidelines present information on the state statutes regarding facilities implementation and describe industry standards.…

An Infrastructure Museum

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roman, Harry T.

2013-01-01

This article invites teachers to let their students' imaginations soar as they become part of a team that will design a whole new kind of living technological museum, a facility that celebrates the world of infrastructure. In this activity, a new two-story building will be built, occupying a vacant corner parcel of land, approximately 150…

The Condition of the Infrastructure of New York Schools: Who Pays and Who Benefits?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crampton, Faith E.

1991-01-01

Insufficient resource allocation to facilities maintenance and decisions to defer maintenance are contributors to a backlog of deferred maintenance nationwide. Focuses on the infrastructure of New York schools and suggests incentives at the state level to ensure adequate attention is given to plant maintenance. (eight references) (MLF)

76 FR 19122 - Record of Decision (ROD) for Authorizing the Use of Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Sand Resources...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-04-06

... Aeronautics and Space Administration's Wallops Flight Facility Shoreline Restoration and Infrastructure... authorize the use of OCS sand resources in National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Wallops... infrastructure on the WFF (such as rocket launch pads, runways, and launch control centers) valued at over $1...

How Critical Is Critical Infrastructure?

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-09-01

electrical power, telecommunications, transportation, petroleum liquid , or natural gas as shown in Figure 34 from the National Infrastructure Protection...Natural Gas Segment  Food and Agriculture Sector  Government facilities Sector  Healthcare and Public Health Sector  Information Technology...514 religious meeting places, 127 gas 69 “Current United States GDP,” 2015, http

The Effect of Infrastructure Sharing in Estimating Operations Cost of Future Space Transportation Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sundaram, Meenakshi

2005-01-01

NASA and the aerospace industry are extremely serious about reducing the cost and improving the performance of launch vehicles both manned or unmanned. In the aerospace industry, sharing infrastructure for manufacturing more than one type spacecraft is becoming a trend to achieve economy of scale. An example is the Boeing Decatur facility where both Delta II and Delta IV launch vehicles are made. The author is not sure how Boeing estimates the costs of each spacecraft made in the same facility. Regardless of how a contractor estimates the cost, NASA in its popular cost estimating tool, NASA Air force Cost Modeling (NAFCOM) has to have a method built in to account for the effect of infrastructure sharing. Since there is no provision in the most recent version of NAFCOM2002 to take care of this, it has been found by the Engineering Cost Community at MSFC that the tool overestimates the manufacturing cost by as much as 30%. Therefore, the objective of this study is to develop a methodology to assess the impact of infrastructure sharing so that better operations cost estimates may be made.

Who Delivers without Water? A Multi Country Analysis of Water and Sanitation in the Childbirth Environment.

PubMed

Gon, Giorgia; Restrepo-Méndez, María Clara; Campbell, Oona M R; Barros, Aluísio J D; Woodd, Susannah; Benova, Lenka; Graham, Wendy J

2016-01-01

Hygiene during childbirth is essential to the health of mothers and newborns, irrespective of where birth takes place. This paper investigates the status of water and sanitation in both the home and facility childbirth environments, and for whom and where this is a more significant problem. We used three datasets: a global dataset, with information on the home environment from 58 countries, and two datasets for each of four countries in Eastern Africa: a healthcare facility dataset, and a dataset that incorporated information on facilities and the home environment to create a comprehensive description of birth environments in those countries. We constructed indices of improved water, and improved water and sanitation combined (WATSAN), for the home and healthcare facilities. The Joint Monitoring Program was used to construct indices for household; we tailored them to the facility context-household and facility indices include different components. We described what proportion of women delivered in an environment with improved WATSAN. For those women who delivered at home, we calculated what proportion had improved WATSAN by socio-economic status, education and rural-urban status. Among women delivering at home (58 countries), coverage of improved WATSAN by region varied from 9% to 53%. Fewer than 15% of women who delivered at home in Sub-Saharan Africa, had access to water and sanitation infrastructure (range 0.1% to 37%). This was worse among the poorest, the less educated and those living in rural areas. In Eastern Africa, where we looked at both the home and facility childbirth environment, a third of women delivered in an environment with improved water in Uganda and Rwanda; whereas, 18% of women in Kenya and 7% in Tanzania delivered with improved water and sanitation. Across the four countries, less than half of the facility deliveries had improved water, or improved water and sanitation in the childbirth environment. Access to water and sanitation during childbirth is poor across low and middle-income countries. Even when women travel to health facilities for childbirth, they are not guaranteed access to basic WATSAN infrastructure. These indicators should be measured routinely in order to inform improvements.

Volcanic hazards at distant critical infrastructure: A method for bespoke, multi-disciplinary assessment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Odbert, H. M.; Aspinall, W.; Phillips, J.; Jenkins, S.; Wilson, T. M.; Scourse, E.; Sheldrake, T.; Tucker, P.; Nakeshree, K.; Bernardara, P.; Fish, K.

2015-12-01

Societies rely on critical services such as power, water, transport networks and manufacturing. Infrastructure may be sited to minimise exposure to natural hazards but not all can be avoided. The probability of long-range transport of a volcanic plume to a site is comparable to other external hazards that must be considered to satisfy safety assessments. Recent advances in numerical models of plume dispersion and stochastic modelling provide a formalized and transparent approach to probabilistic assessment of hazard distribution. To understand the risks to critical infrastructure far from volcanic sources, it is necessary to quantify their vulnerability to different hazard stressors. However, infrastructure assets (e.g. power plantsand operational facilities) are typically complex systems in themselves, with interdependent components that may differ in susceptibility to hazard impact. Usually, such complexity means that risk either cannot be estimated formally or that unsatisfactory simplifying assumptions are prerequisite to building a tractable risk model. We present a new approach to quantifying risk by bridging expertise of physical hazard modellers and infrastructure engineers. We use a joint expert judgment approach to determine hazard model inputs and constrain associated uncertainties. Model outputs are chosen on the basis of engineering or operational concerns. The procedure facilitates an interface between physical scientists, with expertise in volcanic hazards, and infrastructure engineers, with insight into vulnerability to hazards. The result is a joined-up approach to estimating risk from low-probability hazards to critical infrastructure. We describe our methodology and show preliminary results for vulnerability to volcanic hazards at a typical UK industrial facility. We discuss our findings in the context of developing bespoke assessment of hazards from distant sources in collaboration with key infrastructure stakeholders.

Elemental Concentrations in Urban Green Stormwater Infrastructure Soils.

PubMed

Kondo, Michelle C; Sharma, Raghav; Plante, Alain F; Yang, Yunwen; Burstyn, Igor

2016-01-01

Green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) is designed to capture stormwater for infiltration, detention, evapotranspiration, or reuse. Soils play a key role in stormwater interception at these facilities. It is important to assess whether contamination is occurring in GSI soils because urban stormwater drainage areas often accumulate elements of concern. Soil contamination could affect hydrologic and ecosystem functions. Maintenance workers and the public may also be exposed to GSI soils. We investigated soil elemental concentrations, categorized as macro- and micronutrients, heavy metals, and other elements, at 59 GSI sites in the city of Philadelphia. Non-GSI soil samples 3 to 5 m upland of GSI sites were used for comparison. We evaluated differences in elemental composition in GSI and non-GSI soils; the comparisons were corrected for the age of GSI facility, underlying soil type, street drainage, and surrounding land use. Concentrations of Ca and I were greater than background levels at GSI sites. Although GSI facilities appear to accumulate Ca and I, these elements do not pose a significant human health risk. Elements of concern to human health, including Cd, Hg, and Pb, were either no different or were lower in GSI soils compared with non-GSI soils. However, mean values found across GSI sites were up to four times greater than soil cleanup objectives for residential use. Copyright © by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America, Inc.

The EPOS e-Infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jeffery, Keith; Bailo, Daniele

2014-05-01

The European Plate Observing System (EPOS) is integrating geoscientific information concerning earth movements in Europe. We are approaching the end of the PP (Preparatory Project) phase and in October 2014 expect to continue with the full project within ESFRI (European Strategic Framework for Research Infrastructures). The key aspects of EPOS concern providing services to allow homogeneous access by end-users over heterogeneous data, software, facilities, equipment and services. The e-infrastructure of EPOS is the heart of the project since it integrates the work on organisational, legal, economic and scientific aspects. Following the creation of an inventory of relevant organisations, persons, facilities, equipment, services, datasets and software (RIDE) the scale of integration required became apparent. The EPOS e-infrastructure architecture has been developed systematically based on recorded primary (user) requirements and secondary (interoperation with other systems) requirements through Strawman, Woodman and Ironman phases with the specification - and developed confirmatory prototypes - becoming more precise and progressively moving from paper to implemented system. The EPOS architecture is based on global core services (Integrated Core Services - ICS) which access thematic nodes (domain-specific European-wide collections, called thematic Core Services - TCS), national nodes and specific institutional nodes. The key aspect is the metadata catalog. In one dimension this is described in 3 levels: (1) discovery metadata using well-known and commonly used standards such as DC (Dublin Core) to enable users (via an intelligent user interface) to search for objects within the EPOS environment relevant to their needs; (2) contextual metadata providing the context of the object described in the catalog to enable a user or the system to determine the relevance of the discovered object(s) to their requirement - the context includes projects, funding, organisations involved, persons involved, related publications, facilities, equipment and others, and utilises CERIF (Common European Research Information Format) standard (see www.eurocris.org); (3) detailed metadata which is specific to a domain or to a particular object and includes the schema describing the object to processing software. The other dimension of the metadata concerns the objects described. These are classified into users, services (including software), data and resources (computing, data storage, instruments and scientific equipment). An alternative architecture has been considered: using brokering. This technique has been used especially in North America geoscience projects to interoperate datasets. The technique involves writing software to interconvert between any two node datasets. Given n nodes this implies writing n*(n-1) convertors. EPOS Working Group 7 (e-infrastructures and virtual community) which deals with the design and implementation of a prototype of the EPOS services, chose to use an approach which endows the system with an extreme flexibility and sustainability. It is called the Metadata Catalogue approach. With the use of the catalogue the EPOS system can: 1. interoperate with software, services, users, organisations, facilities, equipment etc. as well as datasets; 2. avoid to write n*(n-1) software convertors and generate as much as possible, through the information contained in the catalogue only n convertors. This is a huge saving - especially in maintenance as the datasets (or other node resources) evolve. We are working on (semi-) automation of convertor generation by metadata mapping - this is leading-edge computer science research; 3. make large use of contextual metadata which enable a user or a machine to: (i) improve discovery of resources at nodes; (ii) improve precision and recall in search; (iii) drive the systems for identification, authentication, authorisation, security and privacy recording the relevant attributes of the node resources and of the user; (iv) manage provenance and long-term digital preservation; The linkage between the Integrated Services, which provide the integration of data and services, with the diverse Thematic Services Nodes is provided by means of a compatibility layer, which includes the aforementioned metadata catalogue. This layer provides 'connectors' to make local data, software and services available through the EPOS Integrated Services layer. In conclusion, we believe the EPOS e-infrastructure architecture is fit for purpose including long-term sustainability and pan-European access to data and services.

The Willard L. Eccles Observatory: Commissioning and Development of Remote Operation Capabilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Springer, Wayne; Dawson, Kyle; Gondolo, Paolo; Ricketts, Paul; Ramsrud, Nicolas; Samarasingha, Upul

2011-03-01

The University of Utah completed construction of the Willard L. Eccles Observatory located on Frisco Peak near Milford, UT in October 2009. The observatory site is located on a prominent peak at an altitude of approximately 9600 feet in a region with minimal light pollution. The Frisco Peak site was chosen after careful consideration of many factors including climate, light pollution and available infrastructure. The facility houses a 32" telescope manufactured by DFM Engineering of Longmont, CO. Further development of remote operation capabilities is currently being undertaken. Monitoring of the weather and seeing conditions are being performed and confirm the excellent nature of the site for astronomical observations. The observatory facilities will be used for educational and public outreach activities as well as research projects. A description of the facility and its planned use will be provided.

LANL: Weapons Infrastructure Briefing to Naval Reactors, July 18, 2017

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chadwick, Frances

Presentation slides address: The Laboratory infrastructure supports hundreds of high hazard, complex operations daily; LANL’s unique science and engineering infrastructure is critical to delivering on our mission; LANL FY17 Budget & Workforce; Direct-Funded Infrastructure Accounts; LANL Org Chart; Weapons Infrastructure Program Office; The Laboratory’s infrastructure relies on both Direct and Indirect funding; NA-50’s Operating, Maintenance & Recapitalization funding is critical to the execution of the mission; Los Alamos is currently executing several concurrent Line Item projects; Maintenance @ LANL; NA-50 is helping us to address D&D needs; We are executing a CHAMP Pilot Project at LANL; G2 = Main Toolmore » for Program Management; MDI: Future Investments are centered on facilities with a high Mission Dependency Index; Los Alamos hosted first “Deep Dive” in November 2016; Safety, Infrastructure & Operations is one of the most important programs at LANL, and is foundational for our mission success.« less

Ubiquitous Green Computing Techniques for High Demand Applications in Smart Environments

PubMed Central

Zapater, Marina; Sanchez, Cesar; Ayala, Jose L.; Moya, Jose M.; Risco-Martín, José L.

2012-01-01

Ubiquitous sensor network deployments, such as the ones found in Smart cities and Ambient intelligence applications, require constantly increasing high computational demands in order to process data and offer services to users. The nature of these applications imply the usage of data centers. Research has paid much attention to the energy consumption of the sensor nodes in WSNs infrastructures. However, supercomputing facilities are the ones presenting a higher economic and environmental impact due to their very high power consumption. The latter problem, however, has been disregarded in the field of smart environment services. This paper proposes an energy-minimization workload assignment technique, based on heterogeneity and application-awareness, that redistributes low-demand computational tasks from high-performance facilities to idle nodes with low and medium resources in the WSN infrastructure. These non-optimal allocation policies reduce the energy consumed by the whole infrastructure and the total execution time. PMID:23112621

Upgrade of the cryogenic infrastructure of SM18, CERN main test facility for superconducting magnets and RF cavities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Perin, A.; Dhalla, F.; Gayet, P.; Serio, L.

2017-12-01

SM18 is CERN main facility for testing superconducting accelerator magnets and superconducting RF cavities. Its cryogenic infrastructure will have to be significantly upgraded in the coming years, starting in 2019, to meet the testing requirements for the LHC High Luminosity project and for the R&D program for superconducting magnets and RF equipment until 2023 and beyond. This article presents the assessment of the cryogenic needs based on the foreseen test program and on past testing experience. The current configuration of the cryogenic infrastructure is presented and several possible upgrade scenarios are discussed. The chosen upgrade configuration is then described and the characteristics of the main newly required cryogenic equipment, in particular a new 35 g/s helium liquefier, are presented. The upgrade implementation strategy and plan to meet the required schedule are then described.

Development and implementation of web based infrastructure for problem management at UNPRI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

WijayaDewantoro, Rico; Wardani, Sumita; Rudy; Surya Perdana Girsang, Batara; Dharma, Abdi

2018-04-01

Information technology drastically affects human way of thinking. It has entered every part of human life and also became one of the most significant contributors to make human life more manageable. Reporting a problem of facilities and infrastructure in Universitas Prima Indonesia was done manually where the complainant have to meet the responsible person directly and describe how the problem looks like. Then, the responsible person only solve the problem but have no good documentation on it like Five Ws and How. Moreover, the other issue is to avoid a person who is mischievous for giving false reports. In this paper, we applied a set of procedures called Universitas Prima Indonesia Problem Management System (UNPRI-PMS) which also integrated with academic information system. Implemetation of UNPRI-PMS affects all of the problems about facilities and infrastructure at Universitas Prima Indonesia can be solved more efficient, structured, and accurate.

Ubiquitous green computing techniques for high demand applications in Smart environments.

PubMed

Zapater, Marina; Sanchez, Cesar; Ayala, Jose L; Moya, Jose M; Risco-Martín, José L

2012-01-01

Ubiquitous sensor network deployments, such as the ones found in Smart cities and Ambient intelligence applications, require constantly increasing high computational demands in order to process data and offer services to users. The nature of these applications imply the usage of data centers. Research has paid much attention to the energy consumption of the sensor nodes in WSNs infrastructures. However, supercomputing facilities are the ones presenting a higher economic and environmental impact due to their very high power consumption. The latter problem, however, has been disregarded in the field of smart environment services. This paper proposes an energy-minimization workload assignment technique, based on heterogeneity and application-awareness, that redistributes low-demand computational tasks from high-performance facilities to idle nodes with low and medium resources in the WSN infrastructure. These non-optimal allocation policies reduce the energy consumed by the whole infrastructure and the total execution time.

Where to go? Strategic modelling of access to emergency shelters in Mozambique.

PubMed

Gall, Melanie

2004-03-01

This paper, through spatial-analysis techniques, examines the accessibility of emergency shelters for vulnerable populations, and outlines the benefits of an extended and permanently established shelter network in central Mozambique. The raster-based modelling approach considers data on land cover, locations of accommodation centres in 2000, settlements and infrastructure. The shelter analysis is a two-step process determining access for vulnerable communities first, followed by a suitability analysis for additional emergency shelter sites. The results indicate the need for both retrofitting existing infrastructure (schools, health posts) to function as shelters during an emergency, and constructing new facilities - at best multi-purpose facilities that can serve as social infrastructure and shelter. Besides assessing the current situation in terms of availability and accessibility of emergency shelters, this paper provides an example of evaluating the effectiveness of humanitarian assistance without conventional mechanisms like food tonnage and number of beneficiaries.

Energy Fact Sheets - Sandia Energy

Science.gov Websites

; Components Compatibility Hydrogen Behavior Quantitative Risk Assessment Technical Reference for Hydrogen Combustion jbei Facilities Algae Testbed Battery Abuse Testing Laboratory Center for Infrastructure Research and Innovation Combustion Research Facility Joint BioEnergy Institute Close Energy Research Programs

Integration of bicycling and walking facilities into the infrastructure of urban communities.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-02-01

Several manuals, handbooks and web resources exist to provide varied guidance on planning for and designing bicycle and pedestrian facilities, yet there are no specific indications about which of the varied treatments in these guides work well for us...

Integration of Bicycling and Walking Facilities into the Infrastructure of Urban Communities

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2012-02-01

Several manuals, handbooks and web resources exist to provide varied guidance on planning for and designing bicycle and pedestrian facilities, yet there are no specific indications about which of the varied treatments in these guides work well for us...

77 FR 74678 - Chemical Security Assessment Tool (CSAT)

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-12-17

...), National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD), Office of Infrastructure Protection (IP.../IP/ISCD Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards Program Manager, 245 Murray Lane SW., Mail Stop... should be appropriately marked and submitted by mail to the DHS/NPPD/IP/ISCD Chemical Facility Anti...

Handling Rapid Growth.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Scheideman, Dale; Dufresne, Ray

2001-01-01

Nevada's Clark County, the fastest growing school district in the nation, uses a life-cycle facilities management approach that monitors the individual components of each building on a database. The district's 10-year building program is addressing facilities infrastructure renewal, deferred maintenance, replacement, and new school construction.…

Overview of the Liquid Argon Cryogenics for the Short Baseline Neutrino Program (SBN) at Fermilab

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Norris, Barry; Bremer, Johan; Chalifour, Michel

2017-01-01

The Short-Baseline Neutrino (SBN) physics program will involve three LAr-TPC detectors located along the Booster Neutrino Beam (BNB) at Fermilab. This new SBN Program will deliver a rich and compelling physics opportunity, including the ability to resolve a class of experimental anomalies in neutrino physics and to perform the most sensitive search to date for sterile neutrinos at the eV mass-scale through both appearance and disappearance oscillation channels. The Program will be composed of an existing and operational detector known as Micro Boone (170 ton LAr mass) plus two new experiments known as the SBN Near Detector (SBND, ~ 260more » ton) and the SBN Far Detector (SBN-FD, ~ 600 tons). Fermilab is now building two new facilities to house the experiments and incorporate all cryogenic and process systems to operate these detectors beginning in the 2018-2019 time frame. The SBN cryogenics are a collaborative effort between Fermilab and CERN. The SBN cryogenic systems for both detectors are composed of several sub-systems: External/Infrastructure (or LN2), Proximity (or LAr), and internal cryogenics. For each detector the External/Infrastructure cryogenics includes the equipment used to store and the cryogenic fluids needed for the operation of the Proximity cryogenics, including the LN2 and LAr storage facilities. The Proximity cryogenics consists of all the systems that take the cryogenic fluids from the external/infrastructure cryogenics and deliver them to the internal at the required pressure, temperature, purity and mass flow rate. It includes the condensers, the LAr and GAr purification systems, the LN2 and LAr phase separators, and the interconnecting piping. The Internal cryogenics is comprised of all the cryogenic equipment located within the cryostats themselves, including the GAr and LAr distribution piping and the piping required to cool down the cryostats and the detectors. These cryogenic systems will be engineered, manufactured, commissioned, and qualified by an international engineering team. This contribution presents the performance, the functional requirements and the modes of operation of the SBN cryogenics, and details the current status of the design, present and future needs.« less

Goals and strategies in the global control design of the OAJ Robotic Observatory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yanes-Díaz, A.; Rueda-Teruel, S.; Antón, J. L.; Rueda-Teruel, F.; Moles, M.; Cenarro, A. J.; Marín-Franch, A.; Ederoclite, A.; Gruel, N.; Varela, J.; Cristóbal-Hornillos, D.; Chueca, S.; Díaz-Martín, M. C.; Guillén, L.; Luis-Simoes, R.; Maícas, N.; Lamadrid, J. L.; López-Sainz, A.; Hernández-Fuertes, J.; Valdivielso, L.; Mendes de Oliveira, C.; Penteado, P.; Schoenell, W.; Kanaan, A.

2012-09-01

There are many ways to solve the challenging problem of making a high performance robotic observatory from scratch. The Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre (OAJ) is a new astronomical facility located in the Sierra de Javalambre (Teruel, Spain) whose primary role will be to conduct all-sky astronomical surveys. The OAJ control system has been designed from a global point of view including astronomical subsystems as well as infrastructures and other facilities. Three main factors have been considered in the design of a global control system for the robotic OAJ: quality, reliability and efficiency. We propose CIA (Control Integrated Architecture) design and OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) as a key performance indicator in order to improve operation processes, minimizing resources and obtaining high cost reduction whilst maintaining quality requirements. The OAJ subsystems considered for the control integrated architecture are the following: two wide-field telescopes and their instrumentation, active optics subsystems, facilities for sky quality monitoring (seeing, extinction, sky background, sky brightness, cloud distribution, meteorological station), domes and several infrastructure facilities such as water supply, glycol water, water treatment plant, air conditioning, compressed air, LN2 plant, illumination, surveillance, access control, fire suppression, electrical generators, electrical distribution, electrical consumption, communication network, Uninterruptible Power Supply and two main control rooms, one at the OAJ and the other remotely located in Teruel, 40km from the observatory, connected through a microwave radio-link. This paper presents the OAJ strategy in control design to achieve maximum quality efficiency for the observatory processes and operations, giving practical examples of our approach.

Relevance of an academic GMP Pan-European vector infra-structure (PEVI).

PubMed

Cohen-Haguenauer, O; Creff, N; Cruz, P; Tunc, C; Aïuti, A; Baum, C; Bosch, F; Blomberg, P; Cichutek, K; Collins, M; Danos, O; Dehaut, F; Federspiel, M; Galun, E; Garritsen, H; Hauser, H; Hildebrandt, M; Klatzmann, D; Merten, O W; Montini, E; O'Brien, T; Panet, A; Rasooly, L; Scherman, D; Schmidt, M; Schweitzer, M; Tiberghien, P; Vandendriessche, T; Ziehr, H; Ylä-Herttuala, S; von Kalle, C; Gahrton, G; Carrondo, M

2010-12-01

In the past 5 years, European investigators have played a major role in the development of clinical gene therapy. The provision of substantial funds by some individual member states to construct GMP facilities makes it an opportune time to network available gene therapy GMP facilities at an EU level. The integrated coordination of GMP production facilities and human skills for advanced gene and genetically-modified (GM) cell therapy, can dramatically enhance academic-led "First-in-man" gene therapy trials. Once proof of efficacy is gathered, technology can be transferred to the private sector which will take over further development taking advantage of knowledge and know-how. Complex technical challenges require existing production facilities to adapt to emerging technologies in a coordinated manner. These include a mandatory requirement for the highest quality of production translating gene-transfer technologies with pharmaceutical-grade GMP processes to the clinic. A consensus has emerged on the directions and priorities to adopt, applying to advanced technologies with improved efficacy and safety profiles, in particular AAV, lentivirus-based and oncolytic vectors. Translating cutting-edge research into "First-in-man" trials require that pre-normative research is conducted which aims to develop standard assays, processes and candidate reference materials. This research will help harmonise practices and quality in the production of GMP vector lots and GM-cells. In gathering critical expertise in Europe and establish conditions for interoperability, the PEVI infrastructure will contribute to the demands of the advanced therapy medicinal products* regulation and to both health and quality of life of EU-citizens.

Transportation systems analyses: Volume 1: Executive Summary

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

1993-05-01

The principal objective of this study is to accomplish a systems engineering assessment of the nation's space transportation infrastructure. This analysis addresses the necessary elements to perform man delivery and return, cargo transfer, cargo delivery, payload servicing, and the exploration of the Moon and Mars. Specific elements analyzed, but not limited to, include the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI), the National Launch System (NLS), the current expendable launch vehicle (ELV) fleet, ground facilities, the Space Station Freedom (SSF), and other civil, military and commercial payloads. The performance of this study entails maintaining a broad perspective on the large number of transportation elements that could potentially comprise the U.S. space infrastructure over the next several decades. To perform this systems evaluation, top-level trade studies are conducted to enhance our understanding of the relationships between elements of the infrastructure. This broad 'infrastructure-level perspective' permits the identification of preferred infrastructures. Sensitivity analyses are performed to assure the credibility and usefulness of study results. This executive summary of the transportation systems analyses (TSM) semi-annual report addresses the SSF logistics resupply. Our analysis parallels the ongoing NASA SSF redesign effort. Therefore, there could be no SSF design to drive our logistics analysis. Consequently, the analysis attempted to bound the reasonable SSF design possibilities (and the subsequent transportation implications). No other strategy really exists until after a final decision is rendered on the SSF configuration.

Transportation Energy Futures Series: Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Expansion: Costs, Resources, Production Capacity, and Retail Availability for Low-Carbon Scenarios

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Melaina, M. W.; Heath, G.; Sandor, D.

2013-04-01

Achieving the Department of Energy target of an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 depends on transportation-related strategies combining technology innovation, market adoption, and changes in consumer behavior. This study examines expanding low-carbon transportation fuel infrastructure to achieve deep GHG emissions reductions, with an emphasis on fuel production facilities and retail components serving light-duty vehicles. Three distinct low-carbon fuel supply scenarios are examined: Portfolio: Successful deployment of a range of advanced vehicle and fuel technologies; Combustion: Market dominance by hybridized internal combustion engine vehicles fueled by advanced biofuels and natural gas; Electrification: Market dominance by electric drive vehiclesmore » in the LDV sector, including battery electric, plug-in hybrid, and fuel cell vehicles, that are fueled by low-carbon electricity and hydrogen. A range of possible low-carbon fuel demand outcomes are explored in terms of the scale and scope of infrastructure expansion requirements and evaluated based on fuel costs, energy resource utilization, fuel production infrastructure expansion, and retail infrastructure expansion for LDVs. This is one of a series of reports produced as a result of the Transportation Energy Futures (TEF) project, a Department of Energy-sponsored multi-agency project initiated to pinpoint underexplored transportation-related strategies for abating GHGs and reducing petroleum dependence.« less

Strategy to increase Barangan Banana production in Kabupaten Deli Serdang

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Adhany, I.; Chalil, D.; Ginting, R.

2018-02-01

This study was conducted to analyze internal and external factors in increasing Barangan Banana production in Kabupaten Deli Serdang. Samples were determined by snowball sampling technique and purposive sampling method. Using SWOT analysis method, this study found that there were 6 internal strategic factors and 9 external strategic factors. Among that strategic factors, support for production facilities appears as the most important internal strategic factor, while the demand for Barangan Banana. as the most important external strategic factor. Based on the importance and existing condition of these strategic factors, using support for production facilities and realization of supporting facilities with farming experience are the strategies covering strength-opportunity (SO), organizing mentoring to meet the demand for Barangan Banana are the strategies covering weakness-opportunity (WO), making use of funding support and subsidies to widen the land, using tissue culture seeds and facilities and infrastructures are the strategies covering strength-threat (ST), increas the funding support to widen the land, the use of tissue culture seeds and facilities and infrastructures are the strategies covering weakness-threat (WT) are discussed and proposed to increase Barangan Banana productivity in Kabupaten Deli Serdang.

How to improve the comfort of Kesawan Heritage Corridor, Medan City

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tegar; Ginting, Nurlisa; Suwantoro, H.

2018-03-01

Comfort is indispensable to make a friendly neighborhood or city. Especially the comfort of the infrastructure in the corridor. People must be able to feel comfortable to act rationally in their physical environment. Existing infrastructure must able to support Kesawan as a historic district. Kesawan is an area that is filled with so many unique buildings. Without comfort, how good the existing buildings’ architecture cannot be enjoyed. It will also affect the identity of a region or city. The aim of this research is to re-design the public facilities from Kesawan corridor’s comfort aspect: orientation, traffic calming, vegetation, signage, public facilities (toilet, seating place, bus station, bins), information center, parking and pedestrian path. It will translate the design concept in the form of design criteria. This research uses qualitative methods. Some facilities in this corridor are unsuitable even some of them are not available. So, we need some improvements and additions to the existing facilities. It is expected that by upgrading the existing facilities, visitors who come to Kesawan will be able to enjoy more and able to make Medan city more friendly.

Shaw Air Force Base Capital Improvement Program Environmental Assessment

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-05-01

storage tank VOC volatile organic compound WINDO Wing Infrastructure Development Outlook WWTP Wastewater Treatment Plant FINDING OF NO...efficiency and synergy. Outdated facilities would be demolished to provide opportunities for future base development . No additional personnel would be...facilities. The demolition of outdated facilities would provide more opportunities for future development that would be more consistent with existing land

The Forgotten Side of School Finance Equity: The Role of Infrastructure Funding in Student Success

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crampton, Faith E.; Thompson, David C.; Vesely, Randall S.

2004-01-01

Traditionally, local school districts have shouldered the burden of funding school infrastructure in the name of local control, relying upon local property tax revenues and the willingness of local voters to approve bond issues. Given vast disparities in school districts' property wealth, gross inequities in school facilities will remain without…

"Measuring Operational Effectiveness of Information Technology Infrastructure Library (IIL) and the Impact of Critical Facilities Inclusion in the Process."

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Woodell, Eric A.

2013-01-01

Information Technology (IT) professionals use the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) process to better manage their business operations, measure performance, improve reliability and lower costs. This study examined the operational results of those data centers using ITIL against those that do not, and whether the results change…

Radioactive Waste Management and Nuclear Facility Decommissioning Progress in Iraq - 13216

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Al-Musawi, Fouad; Shamsaldin, Emad S.; Jasim, Hadi

2013-07-01

Management of Iraq's radioactive wastes and decommissioning of Iraq's former nuclear facilities are the responsibility of Iraq's Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST). The majority of Iraq's former nuclear facilities are in the Al-Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center located a few kilometers from the edge of Baghdad. These facilities include bombed and partially destroyed research reactors, a fuel fabrication facility and radioisotope production facilities. Within these facilities are large numbers of silos, approximately 30 process or waste storage tanks and thousands of drums of uncharacterised radioactive waste. There are also former nuclear facilities/sites that are outside of Al-Tuwaitha and these includemore » the former uranium processing and waste storage facility at Jesira, the dump site near Adaya, the former centrifuge facility at Rashdiya and the former enrichment plant at Tarmiya. In 2005, Iraq lacked the infrastructure needed to decommission its nuclear facilities and manage its radioactive wastes. The lack of infrastructure included: (1) the lack of an organization responsible for decommissioning and radioactive waste management, (2) the lack of a storage facility for radioactive wastes, (3) the lack of professionals with experience in decommissioning and modern waste management practices, (4) the lack of laws and regulations governing decommissioning or radioactive waste management, (5) ongoing security concerns, and (6) limited availability of electricity and internet. Since its creation eight years ago, the MoST has worked with the international community and developed an organizational structure, trained staff, and made great progress in managing radioactive wastes and decommissioning Iraq's former nuclear facilities. This progress has been made, despite the very difficult implementing conditions in Iraq. Within MoST, the Radioactive Waste Treatment and Management Directorate (RWTMD) is responsible for waste management and the Iraqi Decommissioning Directorate (IDD) is responsible for decommissioning activities. The IDD and the RWTMD work together on decommissioning projects. The IDD has developed plans and has completed decommissioning of the GeoPilot Facility in Baghdad and the Active Metallurgical Testing Laboratory (LAMA) in Al-Tuwaitha. Given this experience, the IDD has initiated work on more dangerous facilities. Plans are being developed to characterize, decontaminate and decommission the Tamuz II Research Reactor. The Tammuz Reactor was destroyed by an Israeli air-strike in 1981 and the Tammuz II Reactor was destroyed during the First Gulf War in 1991. In addition to being responsible for managing the decommissioning wastes, the RWTMD is responsible for more than 950 disused sealed radioactive sources, contaminated debris from the first Gulf War and (approximately 900 tons) of naturally-occurring radioactive materials wastes from oil production in Iraq. The RWTMD has trained staff, rehabilitated the Building 39 Radioactive Waste Storage building, rehabilitated portions of the French-built Radioactive Waste Treatment Station, organized and secured thousands of drums of radioactive waste organized and secured the stores of disused sealed radioactive sources. Currently, the IDD and the RWTMD are finalizing plans for the decommissioning of the Tammuz II Research Reactor. (authors)« less

EPM - The European Facility for human physiology research on ISS.

PubMed

Rieschel, Mats; Nasca, Rosario; Junk, Peter; Gerhard, Ingo

2002-07-01

The European Physiology Modules (EPM) Facility is one of the four major Space Station facilities being developed within the framework of ESA's Microgravity Facilities for Columbus (MFC) programme. In order to allow a wide spectrum of physiological studies in weightlessness conditions, the facility provides the infrastructure to accommodate a variable set of scientific equipment. The initial EPM configuration supports experiments in the fields of neuroscience, bone & muscle research, cardiovascular research and metabolism. The International Space Life Science Working Group (ISLSWG) has recommended co-locating EPM with the 2 NASA Human Research Facility racks.

6 CFR 27.215 - Security vulnerability assessments.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... of potential critical assets; identification of hazards and consequences of concern for the facility, its surroundings, its identified critical asset(s), and its supporting infrastructure; and... determination of the relative degree of risk to the facility in terms of the expected effect on each critical...

6 CFR 27.215 - Security vulnerability assessments.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... of potential critical assets; identification of hazards and consequences of concern for the facility, its surroundings, its identified critical asset(s), and its supporting infrastructure; and... determination of the relative degree of risk to the facility in terms of the expected effect on each critical...

6 CFR 27.215 - Security vulnerability assessments.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... of potential critical assets; identification of hazards and consequences of concern for the facility, its surroundings, its identified critical asset(s), and its supporting infrastructure; and... determination of the relative degree of risk to the facility in terms of the expected effect on each critical...

6 CFR 27.215 - Security vulnerability assessments.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... of potential critical assets; identification of hazards and consequences of concern for the facility, its surroundings, its identified critical asset(s), and its supporting infrastructure; and... determination of the relative degree of risk to the facility in terms of the expected effect on each critical...

Environmental Technology Verification Report: Grouts for Wastewater Collection Systems, Avanti International AV-118 Acrylic Chemical Grout

EPA Science Inventory

Municipalities are discovering rapid degradation of infrastructures in wastewater collection and treatment facilities due to the infiltration of water from the surrounding environments. Wastewater facilities are not only wet, but also experience hydrostatic pressure conditions un...

A model for manuscript submitted to the nth IIR conference on overview of the long-baseline neutrino facility cryogenic system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Montanari, David; Adamowski, Mark; Bremer, Johan

2017-03-09

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) collaboration is developing a multi-kiloton Long-Baseline neutrino experiment that will be located one mile underground at the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) in Lead, SD. In the present design, detectors will be located inside four cryostats filled with a total of 68,400 ton of ultrapure liquid argon, at the level of impurities lower than 100 parts per trillion of oxygen equivalent contamination. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) is developing the conventional facilities and cryogenics infrastructure supporting this experiment. The cryogenics system is composed of several sub-systems: External/Infrastructure, Proximity, and Internal cryogenics. It will bemore » engineered, manufactured, commissioned, and qualified by an international engineering team. This contribution highlights the main features of the LBNF cryogenic system. It presents its performance, functional requirements and modes of operations. As a result, it also details the status of the design, present and future needs.« less

The multi-modal Australian ScienceS Imaging and Visualization Environment (MASSIVE) high performance computing infrastructure: applications in neuroscience and neuroinformatics research

PubMed Central

Goscinski, Wojtek J.; McIntosh, Paul; Felzmann, Ulrich; Maksimenko, Anton; Hall, Christopher J.; Gureyev, Timur; Thompson, Darren; Janke, Andrew; Galloway, Graham; Killeen, Neil E. B.; Raniga, Parnesh; Kaluza, Owen; Ng, Amanda; Poudel, Govinda; Barnes, David G.; Nguyen, Toan; Bonnington, Paul; Egan, Gary F.

2014-01-01

The Multi-modal Australian ScienceS Imaging and Visualization Environment (MASSIVE) is a national imaging and visualization facility established by Monash University, the Australian Synchrotron, the Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), and the Victorian Partnership for Advanced Computing (VPAC), with funding from the National Computational Infrastructure and the Victorian Government. The MASSIVE facility provides hardware, software, and expertise to drive research in the biomedical sciences, particularly advanced brain imaging research using synchrotron x-ray and infrared imaging, functional and structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), x-ray computer tomography (CT), electron microscopy and optical microscopy. The development of MASSIVE has been based on best practice in system integration methodologies, frameworks, and architectures. The facility has: (i) integrated multiple different neuroimaging analysis software components, (ii) enabled cross-platform and cross-modality integration of neuroinformatics tools, and (iii) brought together neuroimaging databases and analysis workflows. MASSIVE is now operational as a nationally distributed and integrated facility for neuroinfomatics and brain imaging research. PMID:24734019

Evolution of Safeguards over Time: Past, Present, and Projected Facilities, Material, and Budget

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kollar, Lenka; Mathews, Caroline E.

This study examines the past trends and evolution of safeguards over time and projects growth through 2030. The report documents the amount of nuclear material and facilities under safeguards from 1970 until present, along with the corresponding budget. Estimates for the future amount of facilities and material under safeguards are made according to non-nuclear-weapons states’ (NNWS) plans to build more nuclear capacity and sustain current nuclear infrastructure. Since nuclear energy is seen as a clean and economic option for base load electric power, many countries are seeking to either expand their current nuclear infrastructure, or introduce nuclear power. In ordermore » to feed new nuclear power plants and sustain existing ones, more nuclear facilities will need to be built, and thus more nuclear material will be introduced into the safeguards system. The projections in this study conclude that a zero real growth scenario for the IAEA safeguards budget will result in large resource gaps in the near future.« less

Responding to the Event Deluge

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Williams, Roy D.; Barthelmy, Scott D.; Denny, Robert B.; Graham, Matthew J.; Swinbank, John

2012-01-01

We present the VOEventNet infrastructure for large-scale rapid follow-up of astronomical events, including selection, annotation, machine intelligence, and coordination of observations. The VOEvent.standard is central to this vision, with distributed and replicated services rather than centralized facilities. We also describe some of the event brokers, services, and software that .are connected to the network. These technologies will become more important in the coming years, with new event streams from Gaia, LOF AR, LIGO, LSST, and many others

Environmental Assessment for East Housing Area Solar Energy Project, Vandenberg Air Force Base, California

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-07-01

would meet the Project’s purpose and need. The Proposed Action hereinafter “Project” includes leasing land to and entering into a Power Purchase...Agreement (PPA) with a private developer who would design, construct, operate and maintain an unmanned photovoltaic (PV) solar energy facility at the...infrastructure (e.g., roads, power lines, water). The Project is projected to provide almost 25 percent of VAFB’s electrical energy and is not

InaSAFE applications in disaster preparedness

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pranantyo, Ignatius Ryan; Fadmastuti, Mahardika; Chandra, Fredy

2015-04-01

Disaster preparedness activities aim to reduce the impact of disasters by being better prepared to respond when a disaster occurs. In order to better anticipate requirements during a disaster, contingency planning activities can be undertaken prior to a disaster based on a realistic disaster scenario. InaSAFE is a tool that can inform this process. InaSAFE is a free and open source software that estimates the impact to people and infrastructure from potential hazard scenarios. By using InaSAFE, disaster managers can develop scenarios of disaster impacts (people and infrastructures affected) to inform their contingency plan and emergency response operation plan. While InaSAFE provides the software framework exposure data and hazard data are needed as inputs to run this software. Then InaSAFE can be used to forecast the impact of the hazard scenario to the exposure data. InaSAFE outputs include estimates of the number of people, buildings and roads are affected, list of minimum needs (rice and clean water), and response checklist. InaSAFE is developed by Indonesia's National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) and the Australian Government, through the Australia-Indonesia Facility for Disaster Reduction (AIFDR), in partnership with the World Bank - Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR). This software has been used in many parts of Indonesia, including Padang, Maumere, Jakarta, and Slamet Mountain for emergency response and contingency planning.

The highly successful safe remediation of the Fernald waste pits undertaken under the privatization model

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cherry, Mark; Lojek, Dave; Murphy, Con

2003-02-23

Remediation of eight waste pits at the Department of Energy (DOE) Fernald site, located northwest of Cincinnati, Ohio, involves excavating approximately one million tonnes in-situ of low-level waste which were placed in pits during Fernald's production era. This unique project, one of the largest in the history of CERCLA/Superfund, includes uranium and thorium contaminated waste, soils and sludges. These wet soils and sludges are thermally dried in a processing facility to meet Department of Transportation (DOT) transportation and disposal facility waste acceptance criteria, loaded into railcars and shipped to the Envirocare waste disposal facility at Clive, Utah. This project ismore » now approximately 60% complete with more than 415,000 tonnes (460,000 tons) of waste material safely shipped in 74 unit trains to Envirocare. Work is scheduled to be completed in early 2005. Success to date demonstrates that a major DOE site remediation project can be safely and successfully executed in partnership with private industry, utilizing proven commercial best practices, existing site labor resources and support of local stakeholders. In 1997 under the DOE's privatization initiative, Fluor Fernald, Inc. (Fluor Fernald) solicited the services of the remediation industry to design, engineer, procure, construct, own and operate a facility that would undertake the remediation of the waste pits. The resulting procurement was awarded to IT Corporation, currently Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure, Inc. (Shaw). The contractor was required to finance the procurement and construction of its facilities and infrastructure. The contract was performance-based and payment would be made on the successful loadout of the waste from the facility on a per-ton basis meeting the Envirocare waste acceptance criteria. This paper details the performance to date, the challenges encountered, and the seamless partnering between DOE, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Fluor Fernald, Shaw, labor un ions, and the local community in creating and executing a successful project.« less

Vulnerability Assessments and Resilience Planning at Federal Facilities. Preliminary Synthesis of Project

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Moss, R. H.; Blohm, A. J.; Delgado, A.

2015-08-15

U.S. government agencies are now directed to assess the vulnerability of their operations and facilities to climate change and to develop adaptation plans to increase their resilience. Specific guidance on methods is still evolving based on the many different available frameworks. Agencies have been experimenting with these frameworks and approaches. This technical paper synthesizes lessons and insights from a series of research case studies conducted by the investigators at facilities of the U.S. Department of Energy and the Department of Defense. The purpose of the paper is to solicit comments and feedback from interested program managers and analysts before finalmore » conclusions are published. The paper describes the characteristics of a systematic process for prioritizing needs for adaptation planning at individual facilities and examines requirements and methods needed. It then suggests a framework of steps for vulnerability assessments at Federal facilities and elaborates on three sets of methods required for assessments, regardless of the detailed framework used. In a concluding section, the paper suggests a roadmap to further develop methods to support agencies in preparing for climate change. The case studies point to several preliminary conclusions; (1) Vulnerability assessments are needed to translate potential changes in climate exposure to estimates of impacts and evaluation of their significance for operations and mission attainment, in other words into information that is related to and useful in ongoing planning, management, and decision-making processes; (2) To increase the relevance and utility of vulnerability assessments to site personnel, the assessment process needs to emphasize the characteristics of the site infrastructure, not just climate change; (3) A multi-tiered framework that includes screening, vulnerability assessments at the most vulnerable installations, and adaptation design will efficiently target high-risk sites and infrastructure; (4) Vulnerability assessments can be connected to efforts to improve facility resilience to motivate participation; and (5) Efficient, scalable methods for vulnerability assessment can be developed, but additional case studies and evaluation are required.« less

Overview: Development of the National Ignition Facility and the Transition to a User Facility for the Ignition Campaign and High Energy Density Scientific Research

DOE PAGES

Moses, E. I.; Lindl, J. D.; Spaeth, M. L.; ...

2017-03-23

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has been operational since March 2009 and has been transitioning to a user facility supporting ignition science, high energy density stockpile science, national security applications, and fundamental science. The facility has achieved its design goal of 1.8 MJ and 500 TW of 3ω light on target, and has performed target experiments with 1.9 MJ at peak powers of 410 TW. The National Ignition Campaign (NIC), established by the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration in 2005, was responsible for transitioning NIF from a construction project to a national user facility. Besidesmore » the operation and optimization of the use of the NIF laser, the NIC program was responsible for developing capabilities including target fabrication facilities; cryogenic layering capabilities; over 60 optical, X-ray, and nuclear diagnostic systems; experimental platforms; and a wide range of other NIF facility infrastructure. This study provides a summary of some of the key experimental results for NIF to date, an overview of the NIF facility capabilities, and the challenges that were met in achieving these capabilities. Finally, they are covered in more detail in the papers that follow.« less

Overview: Development of the National Ignition Facility and the Transition to a User Facility for the Ignition Campaign and High Energy Density Scientific Research

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Moses, E. I.; Lindl, J. D.; Spaeth, M. L.

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has been operational since March 2009 and has been transitioning to a user facility supporting ignition science, high energy density stockpile science, national security applications, and fundamental science. The facility has achieved its design goal of 1.8 MJ and 500 TW of 3ω light on target, and has performed target experiments with 1.9 MJ at peak powers of 410 TW. The National Ignition Campaign (NIC), established by the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration in 2005, was responsible for transitioning NIF from a construction project to a national user facility. Besidesmore » the operation and optimization of the use of the NIF laser, the NIC program was responsible for developing capabilities including target fabrication facilities; cryogenic layering capabilities; over 60 optical, X-ray, and nuclear diagnostic systems; experimental platforms; and a wide range of other NIF facility infrastructure. This study provides a summary of some of the key experimental results for NIF to date, an overview of the NIF facility capabilities, and the challenges that were met in achieving these capabilities. Finally, they are covered in more detail in the papers that follow.« less

Sewage Management Changes in the North-eastern Poland After Accession to the European Union

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Skarżyński, Szymon; Bartkowska, Izabela

2018-02-01

Poland's accession to the European Union contributed to the infrastructure development of the whole country. One of the elements of the modernized infrastructure is the sewage network and facilities on this network, as well as facilities for waste water treatment and disposal of sludge. A wide stream of funds flowing to the country, and consequently also to the north-eastern polish voivodeships (Podlaskie, Warmian-Masurian, Lublin), allowed modernization, organize, and sometimes to build a new sewage management of this part of the country. The main factors and parameters that allow us to evaluate the development of the sewage management in north-eastern Poland are included: percentage of population using sewage treatment plants, number of municipal sewage plants with the division of their type, number of industrial plants, number of septic tanks, amount of sewage purified in a year, amount of sludge produced in the year, design capacity of sewage treatment plant, size of plant in population equivalent (PE). From a number of investments in the field of wastewater management carried out in the discussed area in the period after Poland's accession to the European Union, 9 investments were considered the most important, 3 from each of the voivodeships.

Feasibility of Ground Testing a Moon and Mars Surface Power Reactor in EBR-II

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sheryl Morton; Carl Baily; Tom Hill

Ground testing of a surface fission power system would be necessary to verify the design and validate reactor performance to support safe and sustained human exploration of the Moon and Mars. The Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has several facilities that could be adapted to support a ground test. This paper focuses on the feasibility of ground testing at the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-II) facility and using other INL existing infrastructure to support such a test. This brief study concludes that the INL EBR-II facility and supporting infrastructure are a viable option for ground testing the surface power system. Itmore » provides features and attributes that offer advantages to locating and performing ground testing at this site, and it could support the National Aeronautics and Space Administration schedules for human exploration of the Moon. This study used the initial concept examined by the U.S. Department of Energy Inter-laboratory Design and Analysis Support Team for surface power, a lowtemperature, liquid-metal, three-loop Brayton power system. With some facility modification, the EBR-II can safely house a test chamber and perform long-term testing of the space reactor power system. The INL infrastructure is available to receive and provide bonded storage for special nuclear materials. Facilities adjacent to EBR-II can provide the clean room environment needed to assemble and store the test article assembly, disassemble the power system at the conclusion of testing, and perform posttest examination. Capability for waste disposal is also available at the INL.« less

Feasibility of Ground Testing a Moon and Mars Surface Power Reactor in EBR-II

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Morton, Sheryl L.; Baily, Carl E.; Hill, Thomas J.

Ground testing of a surface fission power system would be necessary to verify the design and validate reactor performance to support safe and sustained human exploration of the Moon and Mars. The Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has several facilities that could be adapted to support a ground test. This paper focuses on the feasibility of ground testing at the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-II) facility and using other INL existing infrastructure to support such a test. This brief study concludes that the INL EBR-II facility and supporting infrastructure are a viable option for ground testing the surface power system. Itmore » provides features and attributes that offer advantages to locating and performing ground testing at this site, and it could support the National Aeronautics and Space Administration schedules for human exploration of the Moon. This study used the initial concept examined by the U.S. Department of Energy Inter-laboratory Design and Analysis Support Team for surface power, a low-temperature, liquid-metal, three-loop Brayton power system. With some facility modification, the EBR-II can safely house a test chamber and perform long-term testing of the space reactor power system. The INL infrastructure is available to receive and provide bonded storage for special nuclear materials. Facilities adjacent to EBR-II can provide the clean room environment needed to assemble and store the test article assembly, disassemble the power system at the conclusion of testing, and perform posttest examination. Capability for waste disposal is also available at the INL.« less

A Plan to Develop a Red Tide Warning System for Seawater Desalination Process Management

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Tae Woo; Yun, Hong Sik

2017-04-01

The holt of the seawater desalination process for fifty five days due to the eight-month long red tide in 2008 in the Persian Gulf, the Middle East, had lost about 10 billion KRW. The POSCO Seawater Desalination facility, located in Gwangyang Bay Area in the Southern Sea, has produced 30,000 tons of fresh water per day since 2014. Since there has been an incident of red time in the area for three months in August, 2012, it is necessary to establish a warning system for red tide that threatens the stable operation of the seawater desalination facility. A red tide warning system can offer the seawater desalination facility manager customized services on red tide information and potential red tide inflow to the water intake. This study aimed to develop a red tide warning system in Gwangyang Bay Area by combining RS, modeling and monitoring technologies, which provides red tide forecasting information with which to effectively control the seawater desalination process. Using the proposed system, the seawater desalination facility manager can take phased measures to cope with the inflow of red tide. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This research was supported by a grant(16IFIP-C088924-03) from Industrial Facilities & Infrastructure Research Program funded by Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport(MOLIT) of the Korea government and the Korea Agency for Infrastructure Technology Advancement (KAIA). This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea(NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education(NRF-2014R1A1A2054975).

Feasibility of Ground Testing a Moon and Mars Surface Power Reactor in EBR-II

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Morton, Sheryl L.; Baily, Carl E.; Hill, Thomas J.; Werner, James E.

2006-01-01

Ground testing of a surface fission power system would be necessary to verify the design and validate reactor performance to support safe and sustained human exploration of the Moon and Mars. The Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has several facilities that could be adapted to support a ground test. This paper focuses on the feasibility of ground testing at the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-II) facility and using other INL existing infrastructure to support such a test. This brief study concludes that the INL EBR-II facility and supporting infrastructure are a viable option for ground testing the surface power system. It provides features and attributes that offer advantages to locating and performing ground testing at this site, and it could support the National Aeronautics and Space Administration schedules for human exploration of the Moon. This study used the initial concept examined by the U.S. Department of Energy Inter-laboratory Design and Analysis Support Team for surface power, a low-temperature, liquid-metal, three-loop Brayton power system. With some facility modification, the EBR-II can safely house a test chamber and perform long-term testing of the space reactor power system. The INL infrastructure is available to receive and provide bonded storage for special nuclear materials. Facilities adjacent to EBR-II can provide the clean room environment needed to assemble and store the test article assembly, disassemble the power system at the conclusion of testing, and perform posttest examination. Capability for waste disposal is also available at the INL.

Cyberinfrastructure for the digital brain: spatial standards for integrating rodent brain atlases

PubMed Central

Zaslavsky, Ilya; Baldock, Richard A.; Boline, Jyl

2014-01-01

Biomedical research entails capture and analysis of massive data volumes and new discoveries arise from data-integration and mining. This is only possible if data can be mapped onto a common framework such as the genome for genomic data. In neuroscience, the framework is intrinsically spatial and based on a number of paper atlases. This cannot meet today's data-intensive analysis and integration challenges. A scalable and extensible software infrastructure that is standards based but open for novel data and resources, is required for integrating information such as signal distributions, gene-expression, neuronal connectivity, electrophysiology, anatomy, and developmental processes. Therefore, the International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF) initiated the development of a spatial framework for neuroscience data integration with an associated Digital Atlasing Infrastructure (DAI). A prototype implementation of this infrastructure for the rodent brain is reported here. The infrastructure is based on a collection of reference spaces to which data is mapped at the required resolution, such as the Waxholm Space (WHS), a 3D reconstruction of the brain generated using high-resolution, multi-channel microMRI. The core standards of the digital atlasing service-oriented infrastructure include Waxholm Markup Language (WaxML): XML schema expressing a uniform information model for key elements such as coordinate systems, transformations, points of interest (POI)s, labels, and annotations; and Atlas Web Services: interfaces for querying and updating atlas data. The services return WaxML-encoded documents with information about capabilities, spatial reference systems (SRSs) and structures, and execute coordinate transformations and POI-based requests. Key elements of INCF-DAI cyberinfrastructure have been prototyped for both mouse and rat brain atlas sources, including the Allen Mouse Brain Atlas, UCSD Cell-Centered Database, and Edinburgh Mouse Atlas Project. PMID:25309417

Cyberinfrastructure for the digital brain: spatial standards for integrating rodent brain atlases.

PubMed

Zaslavsky, Ilya; Baldock, Richard A; Boline, Jyl

2014-01-01

Biomedical research entails capture and analysis of massive data volumes and new discoveries arise from data-integration and mining. This is only possible if data can be mapped onto a common framework such as the genome for genomic data. In neuroscience, the framework is intrinsically spatial and based on a number of paper atlases. This cannot meet today's data-intensive analysis and integration challenges. A scalable and extensible software infrastructure that is standards based but open for novel data and resources, is required for integrating information such as signal distributions, gene-expression, neuronal connectivity, electrophysiology, anatomy, and developmental processes. Therefore, the International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF) initiated the development of a spatial framework for neuroscience data integration with an associated Digital Atlasing Infrastructure (DAI). A prototype implementation of this infrastructure for the rodent brain is reported here. The infrastructure is based on a collection of reference spaces to which data is mapped at the required resolution, such as the Waxholm Space (WHS), a 3D reconstruction of the brain generated using high-resolution, multi-channel microMRI. The core standards of the digital atlasing service-oriented infrastructure include Waxholm Markup Language (WaxML): XML schema expressing a uniform information model for key elements such as coordinate systems, transformations, points of interest (POI)s, labels, and annotations; and Atlas Web Services: interfaces for querying and updating atlas data. The services return WaxML-encoded documents with information about capabilities, spatial reference systems (SRSs) and structures, and execute coordinate transformations and POI-based requests. Key elements of INCF-DAI cyberinfrastructure have been prototyped for both mouse and rat brain atlas sources, including the Allen Mouse Brain Atlas, UCSD Cell-Centered Database, and Edinburgh Mouse Atlas Project.

PubMed Central

Fernandes, Pedro; Gevaert, Kris; Rothacker, Julie; Saiyed, Taslimarif; Detwiler, Michelle

2012-01-01

This roundtable will feature four international speakers who will discuss national and international collaborative initiatives and outreach efforts in which they participate. They will share how these efforts have facilitated access to cutting-edge technology, fostered new generations of scientists, and ultimately advanced the progression of global scientific research. Open discussion will follow the presentations! Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms, National Centre for Biological Sciences, India: experiences in implementing a national high-end core facility organization with the goals of improving regional technology access and enhancing the quality of research for scientists in academia, biotechnology companies, and the biopharmaceutical industry.Monash University Technology Platforms and Broader Victorian and Australian Networks: Australian initiatives to build global research capabilities and identify means to internationally benchmark regional capabilities to ensure delivery of world class infrastructure. Within the context of the current Australian strategic framework, funding considerations will be discussed, along with expectations for partner facilities to collaborate and be fully accessible to academia and industry.Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciencia, Portugal and beyond: Multiple roles of networking in science and extending outreach while consolidating community integration. Discussion will include achievement of community building and integration using concepts of sharing, training, resource availability, and the value and empowerment gained using acquired skills. The role of networking and institutional visibility will also be discussed.PRIME-XS: This EU-funded consortium provides an infrastructure of proteomics technologies to the European research community. The core is formed by six access facilities through which the consortium provides access to their technologies. Twelve partners work together to develop new resources to aid the community including the development of bioinformatic tools to analyze large-scale proteomics data and novel technologies to analyze protein interaction networks, post-translational modifications and more sensitive ways to detect protein and peptide biomarkers in complex samples.

Utilizing Regional Centers in Sustaining Upgraded Russian Federation Ministry of Defense Sites

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kaldenbach, Karen Yvonne; Chainikov, General Vladimir; Fedorov, General Victor

2010-01-01

Since the mid-1990s the governments of the United States (U.S.) and the Russian Federation (RF) have been collaborating on nonproliferation projects, particularly in the protection of nuclear material through the Department of Energy's (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). To date, this collaboration has resulted in upgrades to more than 72 RF Ministry of Defense (MOD) sensitive sites and facilities. These upgrades include physical protection systems (PPS), facilities to ensure material remains secure in various configurations, and infrastructure to support, maintain, and sustain upgraded sites. Significant effort on the part of both governments has also been expended to ensure thatmore » personnel obtain the necessary skills and training to both operate and maintain the security systems, thereby ensuring long term sustainability. To accomplish this, initial vendor training on physical protection systems was provided to key personnel, and an approved training curriculum was developed to teach the skills of operating, managing, administering, and maintaining the installed physical protection systems. This approach also included documentation of the processes and procedures to support infrastructure, requisite levels of maintenance and testing of systems and equipment, lifecycle management support, inventory systems and spare parts caches. One of the core components in the U.S. exit strategy and full transition to the RF MOD is the development and utilization of regional centers to facilitate centralized training and technical support to upgraded MOD sites in five regions of the RF. To date, two regional centers and one regional classroom facility are functional, and two additional regional centers are currently under construction. This paper will address the process and logistics of regional center establishment and the future vision for integrated regional center support by the RF MOD.« less

Facilities of the Future

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Grayson, Jennifer

2009-01-01

The bricks-and-mortar infrastructure of community colleges has not nearly kept pace with increases in student enrollments. Not only are colleges bursting at the proverbial seams, but, according to the American Graduation Initiative, many two-year institutions "face large needs due to deferred maintenance or lack the modern facilities and…

Science and Technology Facilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moonen, Jean-Marie; Buono, Nicolas; Handfield, Suzanne

2004-01-01

These four articles relate to science and technology infrastructure for secondary and tertiary institutions. The first article presents a view on approaches to teaching science in school and illustrates ideal science facilities for secondary education. The second piece reports on work underway to improve the Science Complex at the "Universite…

STILTS -- Starlink Tables Infrastructure Library Tool Set

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Taylor, Mark

STILTS is a set of command-line tools for processing tabular data. It has been designed for, but is not restricted to, use on astronomical data such as source catalogues. It contains both generic (format-independent) table processing tools and tools for processing VOTable documents. Facilities offered include crossmatching, format conversion, format validation, column calculation and rearrangement, row selection, sorting, plotting, statistical calculations and metadata display. Calculations on cell data can be performed using a powerful and extensible expression language. The package is written in pure Java and based on STIL, the Starlink Tables Infrastructure Library. This gives it high portability, support for many data formats (including FITS, VOTable, text-based formats and SQL databases), extensibility and scalability. Where possible the tools are written to accept streamed data so the size of tables which can be processed is not limited by available memory. As well as the tutorial and reference information in this document, detailed on-line help is available from the tools themselves. STILTS is available under the GNU General Public Licence.

50 CFR 86.30 - Must I allow the public to use the grant-funded facilities?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... 50 Wildlife and Fisheries 6 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Must I allow the public to use the grant-funded facilities? 86.30 Section 86.30 Wildlife and Fisheries UNITED STATES FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE... INFRASTRUCTURE GRANT (BIG) PROGRAM Public Use of the Facility § 86.30 Must I allow the public to use the grant...

50 CFR 86.31 - How much money may I charge the public to use tie-up facilities?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... 50 Wildlife and Fisheries 6 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false How much money may I charge the public to use tie-up facilities? 86.31 Section 86.31 Wildlife and Fisheries UNITED STATES FISH AND WILDLIFE... PROGRAM BOATING INFRASTRUCTURE GRANT (BIG) PROGRAM Public Use of the Facility § 86.31 How much money may I...

NASA Johnson Space Center: White Sands Test Facility

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aggarwal, Pravin; Kowalski, Robert R.

2011-01-01

This slide presentation reviews the testing facilities and laboratories available at the White Sands Test Facility (WSTF). The mission of WSTF is to provide the expertise and infrastructure to test and evaluate spacecraft materials, components and propulsion systems that enable the safe exploration and use of space. There are nine rocket test stands in two major test areas, six altitude test stands, three ambient test stands,

Visitor’s Guide to Oliktok Point Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Climate Research Facility, North Slope of Alaska

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Desilets, Darin; Helsel, Fred M.; Bendure, Al O.

2016-04-01

The importance of Oliktok Point, Alaska, as a focal point for climate research in the Arctic continues to grow with the addition of a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Monitoring (ARM) Climate Research Facility Mobile Facility (AMF) and the expansion of infrastructure to support airborne measurements. The site hosts a suite of instruments for making multi-year, high-fidelity atmospheric measurements; serves as a base of operations for field campaigns; and contains the only Restricted Airspace and Warning Area in the U.S. Arctic, which enables the use of unmanned aircraft systems. The use of this site by climate researchers involvesmore » several considerations, including its remoteness, harsh climate, and location amid the North Slope oilfields. This guide is intended to help visitors to Oliktok Point navigate this unique physical and administrative environment, and thereby facilitate safe and productive operations.« less

Final Assessment: U.S. Virgin Islands Industrial Development Park and Adjacent Facilities Energy-Efficiency and Micro-Grid Infrastructure

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Petersen, Joseph M.; Boyd, Paul A.; Dahowski, Robert T.

The purpose of this assessment was to undertake an assessment and analysis of cost-effective options for energy-efficiency improvements and the deployment of a micro-grid to increase the energy resilience at the U.S. Virgin Islands Industrial Development Park (IDP) and adjacent facilities in St. Croix, Virgin Islands. The Economic Development Authority sought assistance from the U.S. Department of Energy to undertake this assessment undertaken by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. The assessment included 18 buildings plus the perimeter security lighting at the Virgin Islands Bureau of Correctional Facility, four buildings plus exterior lighting at the IDP, and five buildings (one of whichmore » is to be constructed) at the Virgin Islands Police Department for a total of 27 buildings with a total of nearly 323,000 square feet.« less

Critical infrastructure protection: why physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals need to be involved.

PubMed

Lavin, Roberta; Harrington, Michael B; Agbor-tabi, Elisabeth; Erger, Nurit

2006-01-01

What is present in nearly every U.S. community, performs myriad services from the routine to the life saving on a daily basis, responds to every disaster, and functions 24 hours a day every day of the year? The answer, of course, is the nation's $1.8 trillion public health and healthcare system. Protection of this system's vast infrastructure has assumed increasing urgency since September 11, and there are at least two reasons for this. The first is that this sector must respond to every conceivable event involving risks to human life, including those traditionally within the purview of public health, so its ability to respond to these events must be preserved. The second is that elements of the sector itself face increasing threats to facilities, information systems, and workforces. These reasons alone warrant greater emphasis on protective programs than may have seemed necessary in the past, and the public health and healthcare sector should recognize that it must now understand critical infrastructure protection as well as it does healthcare management.

IEDA: Making Small Data BIG Through Interdisciplinary Partnerships Among Long-tail Domains

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lehnert, K. A.; Carbotte, S. M.; Arko, R. A.; Ferrini, V. L.; Hsu, L.; Song, L.; Ghiorso, M. S.; Walker, D. J.

2014-12-01

The Big Data world in the Earth Sciences so far exists primarily for disciplines that generate massive volumes of observational or computed data using large-scale, shared instrumentation such as global sensor networks, satellites, or high-performance computing facilities. These data are typically managed and curated by well-supported community data facilities that also provide the tools for exploring the data through visualization or statistical analysis. In many other domains, especially those where data are primarily acquired by individual investigators or small teams (known as 'Long-tail data'), data are poorly shared and integrated, lacking a community-based data infrastructure that ensures persistent access, quality control, standardization, and integration of data, as well as appropriate tools to fully explore and mine the data within the context of broader Earth Science datasets. IEDA (Integrated Earth Data Applications, www.iedadata.org) is a data facility funded by the US NSF to develop and operate data services that support data stewardship throughout the full life cycle of observational data in the solid earth sciences, with a focus on the data management needs of individual researchers. IEDA builds on a strong foundation of mature disciplinary data systems for marine geology and geophysics, geochemistry, and geochronology. These systems have dramatically advanced data resources in those long-tail Earth science domains. IEDA has strengthened these resources by establishing a consolidated, enterprise-grade infrastructure that is shared by the domain-specific data systems, and implementing joint data curation and data publication services that follow community standards. In recent years, other domain-specific data efforts have partnered with IEDA to take advantage of this infrastructure and improve data services to their respective communities with formal data publication, long-term preservation of data holdings, and better sustainability. IEDA hopes to foster such partnerships with streamlined data services, including user-friendly, single-point interfaces for data submission, discovery, and access across the partner systems to support interdisciplinary science.

Access Control Management for SCADA Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hong, Seng-Phil; Ahn, Gail-Joon; Xu, Wenjuan

The information technology revolution has transformed all aspects of our society including critical infrastructures and led a significant shift from their old and disparate business models based on proprietary and legacy environments to more open and consolidated ones. Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems have been widely used not only for industrial processes but also for some experimental facilities. Due to the nature of open environments, managing SCADA systems should meet various security requirements since system administrators need to deal with a large number of entities and functions involved in critical infrastructures. In this paper, we identify necessary access control requirements in SCADA systems and articulate access control policies for the simulated SCADA systems. We also attempt to analyze and realize those requirements and policies in the context of role-based access control that is suitable for simplifying administrative tasks in large scale enterprises.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Drryl P. Butt; Brian Jaques

Research conducted for this NERI project has advanced the understanding and feasibility of nitride nuclear fuel processing. In order to perform this research, necessary laboratory infrastructure was developed; including basic facilities and experimental equipment. Notable accomplishments from this project include: the synthesis of uranium, dysprosium, and cerium nitrides using a novel, low-cost mechanical method at room temperature; the synthesis of phase pure UN, DyN, and CeN using thermal methods; and the sintering of UN and (Ux, Dy1-x)N (0.7 ≤ X ≤ 1) pellets from phase pure powder that was synthesized in the Advanced Materials Laboratory at Boise State University.

Evaluating the Impact of Sea Level Rise and Coastal Flooding on NASA Centers and Facilities by Implementing Terrestrial Laser Scanning Surveys to Improve Coastal Digital Elevation and Inundation Models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bell, L. J.; Nerem, R. S.; Williams, K.; Meertens, C.; Lestak, L.; Masters, D.

2014-12-01

Sea level is rising in response to climate change. Currently the global mean rate is a little over 3 mm/year, but it is expected to accelerate significantly over this century. This will have a profound impact on coastal populations and infrastructure, including NASA centers and facilities. A detailed study proposed by the University of Colorado's Center for Astrodynamics Research on the impact of sea level rise on several of NASA's most vulnerable facilities was recently funded by NASA. Individual surveys at several high-risk NASA centers were conducted and used as case studies for a broader investigation that needs to be done for coastal infrastructure around the country. The first two years of this study included implementing and conducting a terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) and GPS survey at Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, Florida, Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Virginia, Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia, and Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California. We are currently using airborne LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) data and TLS (Terrestrial Laser Scanning) data to construct detailed digital elevation models (DEMs) of the facilities that we have assessed. The TLS data acquired at each center provides a very dense point cloud that is being used to improve the detail and accuracy of the digital elevation models currently available. We are also using GPS data we acquired at each center to assess the rate of vertical land movement at the facilities and to tie the DEM to tide gauges and other reference points. With completed, detailed DEMs of the topography and facilities at each center, a series of simple inundation models will then be applied to each area. We will use satellite altimeter data from TOPEX, Jason-1, and Jason-2 to assess the sea level changes observed near these NASA facilities over the last 20 years along with sea level projections from global climate models (GCMs) and semi-empirical projections to make detailed maps of sea level inundation through and up to the years 2050 and 2100 for varying amounts of sea level rise. We will also work with other selected investigators to assess the effects of tidal variations and storm surge when coupled with changes in mean sea level, as storm surge is likely when initial damage due to sea level rise will occur.

Changing the role of the traditional birth attendant in Somaliland.

PubMed

Pyone, Thidar; Adaji, Sunday; Madaj, Barbara; Woldetsadik, Tadesse; van den Broek, Nynke

2014-10-01

To explore the feasibility of changing the role of the traditional birth attendant (TBA) to act as birth companion and promoter of skilled birth attendance. Between 2008 and 2012, 75 TBAs received 3days of training and were paid US $5 for each patient brought to any of five healthcare facilities in Maroodi Jeex, Somaliland. Health facilities were upgraded (infrastructure, drugs and equipment, staff training, and incentivization). Eight key informant interviews (KIIs) and 10 focus group discussions (FGDs) involving 32 TBAs and 32 mothers were conducted. A framework approach was used for analysis. TBAs adopted their new role easily; instead of conducting home births and referring women to a facility only at onset of complications, they accompanied or referred mothers to a nearby facility for delivery, prenatal care, or postnatal care. Both TBAs and mothers accepted this new role, resulting in increased deliveries at health facilities. Facilitating factors included the creation of an enabling environment at the health facility, acceptance of the TBA by health facility staff, and monetary incentivization. Changing the role of the TBA to support facility-based delivery is feasible and acceptable. Further research is needed to see whether this is replicable and can be scaled-up. Copyright © 2014 International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

50 CFR 86.20 - What activities are eligible for funding?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... or privately owned boating infrastructure tie-up facilities. To be eligible you must: (1) Build these... nontrailerable recreational vessels; (3) Build these tie-up facilities in water deep enough for nontrailerable... fluctuation); (4) Provide security, safety, and service for these boats; and, (5) Install a pumpout station...

50 CFR 86.20 - What activities are eligible for funding?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... or privately owned boating infrastructure tie-up facilities. To be eligible you must: (1) Build these... nontrailerable recreational vessels; (3) Build these tie-up facilities in water deep enough for nontrailerable... fluctuation); (4) Provide security, safety, and service for these boats; and, (5) Install a pumpout station...

50 CFR 86.20 - What activities are eligible for funding?

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... publicly or privately owned boating infrastructure tie-up facilities. To be eligible you must: (1) Build... transient nontrailerable recreational vessels; (3) Build these tie-up facilities in water deep enough for... of lowest fluctuation); (4) Provide security, safety, and service for these boats; and, (5) Install a...

76 FR 50289 - Notice of Funding Availability for the Department of Transportation's National Infrastructure...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-08-12

..., 2011, at 5 p.m. EDT (the ``Application Deadline''). The DOT pre-application system will open on or... systems, and projects that connect transportation facilities to other modes of transportation; and (2... existing transportation facilities and systems, with particular emphasis on projects that minimize life...

Evaluating Fuel Leak and Aging Infrastructure at Red Hill, Hawaii, the Largest Underground Fuel Storage Facility in the United States

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

Learn about how EPA Region 9, Hawaii’s Department of Health, U.S. Navy, and Defense Logistics Agency are working tprotect human health and the environment at the Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility in Hawaii.

Master Planning School District Facility Needs

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Prager, Gary; Matschulat, Robert

2010-01-01

Most educational entities confront any number of facility issues. Upgrading the physical infrastructure to meet current and future demands can be intimidating. The quantity and magnitude of capital issues in a changing environment can be overwhelming. How can all this complexity be made coherent to assure that decisions are sound and limited…

A Framework and Metric for resilience concept in water infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Karamouz, M.; Olyaei, M.

2017-12-01

The collaborators of water industries are looking for ways and means to bring resilience into our water infrastructure systems. The key to this conviction is to develop a shared vision among the engineers, builders and decision makers of our water executive branch and policy makers, utilities, community leaders, players, end users and other stakeholders of our urban environment. Among water infrastructures, wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) have a significant role on urban systems' serviceability. These facilities, especially when located in coastal regions, are vulnerable to heavy rain, surface runoff, storm surges and coastal flooding. Flooding can cause overflows from treatment facilities into the natural water bodies and result in environmental predicament of significant proportions. In order to minimize vulnerability to flood, a better understanding of flood risk must be realized. Vulnerability to floods frequency and intensity is increasing by external forcing such as climate change, as well as increased interdependencies in urban systems. Therefore, to quantify the extent of efforts for flood risk management, a unified index is needed for evaluating resiliency of infrastructure. Resiliency is a key concept in understanding vulnerability in dealing with flood. New York City based on its geographic location, its urbanized nature, densely populated area, interconnected water bodies and history of the past flooding events is extremely vulnerable to flood and was selected as the case study. In this study, a framework is developed to evaluate resiliency of WWTPs. An analysis of the current understanding of vulnerability is performed and a new perspective utilizing different components of resiliency including resourcefulness, robustness, rapidity and redundancy is presented. To quantify resiliency and rank the wastewater treatment plants in terms of how resilient they are, an index is developed using Multi Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) technique. Moreover, Improvement of WWTPs' performance is investigated by allocating financial resources to attain a desirable level of resiliency. The result of this study shows the significant value of quantifying and improving flood resiliency of WWTPs that could be used for other water infrastructure and in planning of investment strategies for a region

Large-Scale Cryogenic Testing of Launch Vehicle Ground Systems at the Kennedy Space Center

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ernst, E. W.; Sass, J. P.; Lobemeyer, D. A.; Sojourner, S. J.; Hatfield, W. H.; Rewinkel, D. A.

2007-01-01

The development of a new launch vehicle to support NASA's future exploration plans requires significant redesign and upgrade of Kennedy Space Center's (KSC) launch pad and ground support equipment systems. In many cases, specialized test equipment and systems will be required to certify the function of the new system designs under simulated operational conditions, including propellant loading. This paper provides an overview of the cryogenic test infrastructure that is in place at KSC to conduct development and qualification testing that ranges from the component level to the integrated-system level. An overview of the major cryogenic test facilities will be provided, along with a detailed explanation of the technology focus area for each facility

SPHERES: Synchronized, Position, Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites: SPHERES/Astrobee Working Group (SAWG)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Benavides, Jose

2017-01-01

SPHERES/Astrobee Working Group (SAWG) Quarterly meeting. Membership includes MIT, FIT, AFS, DARPA, CASIS, SJSU, and NASA (HQ, KSC, JSC, MSFC, and ARC)Face-to-Face, twice a year Purpose: Information sharing across the SPHERES community Program office shares National Lab Facility availability Status of resources (batteries, CO2 tanks, etc.), Overall Calendar (scheduled Test Sessions, up mass return), and Updates on new PD, Investigations, and ISS infrastructure. Provide the SPHERES community (PD, investigators, etc.) with up-to-date information to determine opportunities to use the NL Facility Discuss proposed changes updates to SPHERES Nat Lab which may be required to support a specific activity or research. Discuss specific support requests made to the ISS Office.

Status of the LBNF Cryogenic System

DOE PAGES

Montanari, D.; Adamowski, M.; Bremer, J.; ...

2017-12-30

We present that the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) will host the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), an international multi-kiloton Long-Baseline neutrino experiment that will be installed about a mile underground in Lead, SD. In the current configuration four cryostats will contain a modular detector and a total of 68,400 tons of ultrapure liquid argon, with a level of impurities lower than 100 parts per trillion of oxygen equivalent contamination. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) provides the conventional facilities and the cryogenic infrastructure to support DUNE. The system is comprised of three sub-systems: External/Infrastructure, Proximity and Internal cryogenics. An internationalmore » engineering team will design, manufacture, commission, and qualify the LBNF cryogenic system. This contribution presents the modes of operations, layout and main features of the LBNF cryogenic system. Lastly, the expected performance, the functional requirements and the status of the design are also highlighted.« less

Status of the LBNF Cryogenic System

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Montanari, D.; Adamowski, M.; Bremer, J.

We present that the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) will host the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), an international multi-kiloton Long-Baseline neutrino experiment that will be installed about a mile underground in Lead, SD. In the current configuration four cryostats will contain a modular detector and a total of 68,400 tons of ultrapure liquid argon, with a level of impurities lower than 100 parts per trillion of oxygen equivalent contamination. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) provides the conventional facilities and the cryogenic infrastructure to support DUNE. The system is comprised of three sub-systems: External/Infrastructure, Proximity and Internal cryogenics. An internationalmore » engineering team will design, manufacture, commission, and qualify the LBNF cryogenic system. This contribution presents the modes of operations, layout and main features of the LBNF cryogenic system. Lastly, the expected performance, the functional requirements and the status of the design are also highlighted.« less

Status of the LBNF Cryogenic System

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Montanari, D.; Adamowski, M.; Bremer, J.

2017-01-01

The Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) will host the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), an international multi-kiloton Long-Baseline neutrino experiment that will be installed about a mile underground in Lead, SD. In the current configuration four cryostats will contain a modular detector and a total of 68,400 ton of ultrapure liquid argon, with a level of impurities lower than 100 parts per trillion of oxygen equivalent contamination. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) provides the conventional facilities and the cryogenic infrastructure to support DUNE. The system is comprised of three sub-systems: External/Infrastructure, Proximity and Internal cryogenics. An international engineering team willmore » design, manufacture, commission, and qualify the LBNF cryogenic system. This contribution presents the models of operations, layout and main features of the LBNF cryogenic system. The expected performance, the functional requirements and the status of the design are also highlighted.« less

Status of the LBNF Cryogenic System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Montanari, D.; Adamowski, M.; Bremer, J.; Delaney, M.; Diaz, A.; Doubnik, R.; Haaf, K.; Hentschel, S.; Norris, B.; Voirin, E.

2017-12-01

The Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) will host the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), an international multi-kiloton Long-Baseline neutrino experiment that will be installed about a mile underground in Lead, SD. In the current configuration four cryostats will contain a modular detector and a total of 68,400 tons of ultrapure liquid argon, with a level of impurities lower than 100 parts per trillion of oxygen equivalent contamination. The Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) provides the conventional facilities and the cryogenic infrastructure to support DUNE. The system is comprised of three sub-systems: External/Infrastructure, Proximity and Internal cryogenics. An international engineering team will design, manufacture, commission, and qualify the LBNF cryogenic system. This contribution presents the modes of operations, layout and main features of the LBNF cryogenic system. The expected performance, the functional requirements and the status of the design are also highlighted.

Where's the evidence? a systematic review of economic analyses of residential aged care infrastructure.

PubMed

Easton, Tiffany; Milte, Rachel; Crotty, Maria; Ratcliffe, Julie

2017-03-21

Residential care infrastructure, in terms of the characteristics of the organisation (such as proprietary status, size, and location) and the physical environment, have been found to directly influence resident outcomes. This review aimed to summarise the existing literature of economic evaluations of residential care infrastructure. A systematic review of English language articles using AgeLine, CINAHL, Econlit, Informit (databases in Health; Business and Law; Social Sciences), Medline, ProQuest, Scopus, and Web of Science with retrieval up to 14 December 2015. The search strategy combined terms relating to nursing homes, economics, and older people. Full economic evaluations, partial economic evaluations, and randomised trials reporting more limited economic information, such as estimates of resource use or costs of interventions were included. Data was extracted using predefined data fields and synthesized in a narrative summary to address the stated review objective. Fourteen studies containing an economic component were identified. None of the identified studies attempted to systematically link costs and outcomes in the form of a cost-benefit, cost-effectiveness, or cost-utility analysis. There was a wide variation in approaches taken for valuing the outcomes associated with differential residential care infrastructures: 8 studies utilized various clinical outcomes as proxies for the quality of care provided, and 2 focused on resident outcomes including agitation, quality of life, and the quality of care interactions. Only 2 studies included residents living with dementia. Robust economic evidence is needed to inform aged care facility design. Future research should focus on identifying appropriate and meaningful outcome measures that can be used at a service planning level, as well as the broader health benefits and cost-saving potential of different organisational and environmental characteristics in residential care. International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO) registration number CRD42015015977 .

Surface Infiltration Rates of Permeable Surfaces: Six Month ...

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

At the end of October 2009, EPA opened a parking lot on the Edison Environmental Center that included three parking rows of permeable pavement. The construction was a cooperative effort among EPA’s Office of Administration and Resources Management, National Risk Management Research Laboratory, and the facility owner, Region 2. The lot serves as an active parking area for facility staff and visitors and also as a research platform. Key unknowns in the application of green infrastructure include the long term performance and the maintenance requirements. The perceived uncertainty in these is a barrier to widespread adoption of the installation of permeable surfaces for stormwater management. EPA recognizes the need for credible long-term performance maintenance data and has begun a long-term monitoring effort on this installation. This document outlines the methods and results of the surface infiltration monitoring of the permeable parking surfaces during the first six months of operation. To inform the public.

Propellant Analysis and Distillation Unit Design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Barragan, Michelle H.; Spangler, Cindy; Barrera, Louis K.

2007-01-01

The NASA White Sands Test Facility (WSTF) routinely operates hypergolic propulsion systems. Some of the onsite activities include performing long duration studies on the operational life of these systems. A few of them have been in use for over twenty years. During this span of time contamination has built up in the propellant and some of the distribution infrastructure. This study investigated the nature of this contamination, the pathology of its generation, and developed a process for removal of the contamination that was cost efficient with minimal waste generation.

Increasing the productivity of the nation's urban transportation infrastructure: Measures to increase transit use and carpooling. Final report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kain, J.F.; Gittell, R.; Daniere, A.

1992-01-01

The report surveys the growing use of bus and carpool priority measures to increase the productivity of the nation's transportation infrastructure. While it identifies a wide variety of priority measures, the report principally focuses on the planning and operation of exclusive and shared busways and high occupancy vehicle (HOV) facilities. It presents a variety of case studies describing the implementation of busways and transitways. The document also compares the cost effectiveness of exclusive busways and bus-HOV facilities with the cost effectiveness of recently completed light and heavy rail lines. It also explores the options and problems in serving large downtownmore » areas.« less

Laser damage testing of optical components under cryogenic conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Oulehla, Jindrich; Pokorný, Pavel; Lazar, Josef

2012-11-01

In this contribution we present a technology for deposition and testing of interference coatings for optical components designed to operate in power pulsed lasers. The aim of the technology is to prepare components for high power laser facilities such as ELI (Extreme Light Infrastructure) or HiLASE. ELI is a part of the European plan to build a new generation of large research facilities selected by the European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI). These facilities rely on the use of diode pumped solid state lasers (DPSSL). The choice of the material for the lasers' optical components is critical. Some of the most important properties include the ability to be antireflection and high reflection coated to reduce the energy losses and increase the overall efficiency. As large amounts of heat need to be dissipated during laser operation, cryogenic cooling is necessary. The conducted experiments served as preliminary tests of laser damage threshold measurement methodology that we plan to use in the future. We designed a special apparatus consisting of a vacuum chamber and a cooling system. The samples were placed into the vacuum chamber which was evacuated and then the samples were cooled down to approximately 120K and illuminated by a pulsed laser. Pulse duration was in the nanosecond region. Multiple test sites on the sample's surface were used for different laser pulse energies. We used optical and electron microscopy and spectrophotometer measurements for coating investigation after the conducted experiments.

Laser damage testing of optical components under cryogenic conditions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Oulehla, Jindřich; Pokorný, Pavel; Lazar, Josef

2012-01-01

In this contribution we present a technology for deposition and testing of interference coatings for optical components designed to operate in power pulsed lasers. The aim of the technology is to prepare components for high power laser facilities such as ELI (Extreme Light Infrastructure) or HiLASE. ELI is a part of the Eropean plan to build a new generation of large research facilities selected by the the Eropean Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI). These facilities rely on the use of diode pumped solid state lasers (DPSSL). The choice of the material or the lasers' optical components is critical. Some of the most important properties include the ability to be antireflection and high reflection coated to reduce the energy losses and increase the overall efficiency. As large amounts of hear need to be dissipated during laser operation, cryogenic cooling is necessary. The conducted experiments served as preliminary tests of laser damage threshold measurement methodology that we plan to use in the future. We designed a special apparatus consistion of a vacuum chamber an a cooling system. The samples were placed into the vacuum chamber which was evacuated and them the samples were cooled down to approximately 120K and illuminated by a pulsed laser. Pulse duration was in the nanosecond region. Multiple test sites on the sample's surface were used for different laser pulse energies. We used optical and electron microscopy and spectrophotometer measurements for coating investigation after the conducted experiments.

Health system preparedness for integration of mental health services in rural Liberia.

PubMed

Gwaikolo, Wilfred S; Kohrt, Brandon A; Cooper, Janice L

2017-07-27

There are increasing efforts and attention focused on the delivery of mental health services in primary care in low resource settings (e.g., mental health Gap Action Programme, mhGAP). However, less attention is devoted to systematic approaches that identify and address barriers to the development and uptake of mental health services within primary care in low-resource settings. Our objective was to prepare for optimal uptake by identifying barriers in rural Liberia. The country's need for mental health services is compounded by a 14-year history of political violence and the largest Ebola virus disease outbreak in history. Both events have immediate and lasting mental health effects. A mixed-methods approach was employed, consisting of qualitative interviews with 22 key informants and six focus group discussions. Additional qualitative data as well as quantitative data were collected through semi-structured assessments of 19 rural primary care health facilities. Data were collected from March 2013 to March 2014. Potential barriers to development and uptake of mental health services included lack of mental health knowledge among primary health care staff; high workload for primary health care workers precluding addition of mental health responsibilities; lack of mental health drugs; poor physical infrastructure of health facilities including lack of space for confidential consultation; poor communication support including lack of electricity and mobile phone networks that prevent referrals and phone consultation with supervisors; absence of transportation for patients to facilitate referrals; negative attitudes and stigma towards people with severe mental disorders and their family members; and stigma against mental health workers. To develop and facilitate effective primary care mental health services in a post-conflict, low resource setting will require (1) addressing the knowledge and clinical skills gap in the primary care workforce; (2) improving physical infrastructure of health facilities at care delivery points; and (3) implementing concurrent interventions designed to improve attitudes towards people with mental illness, their family members and mental health care providers.

A high resolution agent-based model to support walk-bicycle infrastructure investment decisions: A case study with New York City

DOE PAGES

Aziz, H. M. Abdul; Park, Byung H.; Morton, April M.; ...

2017-11-24

Active transportation modes--walk and bicycle--are central for low carbon transport, healthy living, and complete streets initiative. Building a community with amenable walk and bicycle facilities asks for smart planning and investments. It is critical to investigate the impact of infrastructure building or expansion on the overall walk and bicycle mode usage prior to making investment choices utilizing public tax money. This research developed an agent-based model to support investment decisions that allows to assess the impact of changes in walk-bike infrastructures at a high spatial resolution (e.g., block group level). The agent-based model (ABM) utilizes data from a synthetic populationmore » simulator generating agents with corresponding socio-demographic characteristics, and integrates facility attributes regarding walking and bicycling (e.g., sidewalk width, bike lane length) into the mode choice decision making process. Moreover, the ABM accounts for the effect of social interactions among agents who live and work at the same geographic locations. Finally, GIS-based maps are developed at block group resolution that allows exploring the effect of walk-bike infrastructure related investments. The results from New York City case study indicate that infrastructure investments such as widening sidewalk and increasing bike lane network can positively influence the active transportation mode choices. In addition, the level of impact varies with geographic locations--different boroughs of New York City will have different impacts. Lastly, social promotions resulting in higher social interaction among agents can reinforce the impacts of infrastructure changes.« less

A high resolution agent-based model to support walk-bicycle infrastructure investment decisions: A case study with New York City

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Aziz, H. M. Abdul; Park, Byung H.; Morton, April M.

Active transportation modes--walk and bicycle--are central for low carbon transport, healthy living, and complete streets initiative. Building a community with amenable walk and bicycle facilities asks for smart planning and investments. It is critical to investigate the impact of infrastructure building or expansion on the overall walk and bicycle mode usage prior to making investment choices utilizing public tax money. This research developed an agent-based model to support investment decisions that allows to assess the impact of changes in walk-bike infrastructures at a high spatial resolution (e.g., block group level). The agent-based model (ABM) utilizes data from a synthetic populationmore » simulator generating agents with corresponding socio-demographic characteristics, and integrates facility attributes regarding walking and bicycling (e.g., sidewalk width, bike lane length) into the mode choice decision making process. Moreover, the ABM accounts for the effect of social interactions among agents who live and work at the same geographic locations. Finally, GIS-based maps are developed at block group resolution that allows exploring the effect of walk-bike infrastructure related investments. The results from New York City case study indicate that infrastructure investments such as widening sidewalk and increasing bike lane network can positively influence the active transportation mode choices. In addition, the level of impact varies with geographic locations--different boroughs of New York City will have different impacts. Lastly, social promotions resulting in higher social interaction among agents can reinforce the impacts of infrastructure changes.« less

Opportunity to Save Historical Railway Infrastructure - Adaptation and Functional Conversion of Facilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Podwojewska, Magdalena

2017-10-01

After years of neglect and underinvestment, the Polish railways are now witnessing a rapid modernization of both their technical facilities and rolling stock. However, this is true only of the main railway lines connecting major urban complexes. It is worth pointing out that a great number of secondary lines, railway stations and halts still has not been covered by the transformation process. Railway facilities, warehouses and service features are in decay. Rapid technological developments have caused numerous architectural structures of historical interest and service features to fall out of use. There are historical railway facilities dating back to the late 19th or early 20th centuries, whose condition is constantly deteriorating. The only way to save these structures is to change the manner, in which they are being used, and attract new investors and operators. The adaptation of buildings may be carried out in a number of ways by following different strategies. The process depends on the structure’s current condition and significance for the railway network. The facilities which are disused as a result of technological changes in the rolling stock and infrastructure include workshops, steam locomotive bays, turntables and warehouses. Their size and location within a city make them a perfect place for commercial services, exhibitions, heritage sites, concerts and other events attracting great numbers of people. Other strategies may be used for constructions located next to railways lines, whose role has declined. Such constructions include small railway stations, warehouses, reloading and forwarding facilities, railway ramps, railway staff buildings as well as residences for railway employees. Railway stations located at large junctions can handle passenger traffic or freight loading operations. As well as acting as the only window to the world, railway stations in small towns housed all the services available in the place. At the same time, they served as meeting spots, community centres and places of particular social importance. Therefore, successful renewal requires adaptation and functional conversion in order to cater to the needs of the inhabitants and visiting travellers. Such activities should focus on architectural, social and economic spaces. This paper presents small railway stations of historical value with a view to their adaptive potential, as well as examples of completed adaptation projects.

Assessing the uptake of persistent identifiers by research infrastructure users

PubMed Central

Maull, Keith E.

2017-01-01

Significant progress has been made in the past few years in the development of recommendations, policies, and procedures for creating and promoting citations to data sets, software, and other research infrastructures like computing facilities. Open questions remain, however, about the extent to which referencing practices of authors of scholarly publications are changing in ways desired by these initiatives. This paper uses four focused case studies to evaluate whether research infrastructures are being increasingly identified and referenced in the research literature via persistent citable identifiers. The findings of the case studies show that references to such resources are increasing, but that the patterns of these increases are variable. In addition, the study suggests that citation practices for data sets may change more slowly than citation practices for software and research facilities, due to the inertia of existing practices for referencing the use of data. Similarly, existing practices for acknowledging computing support may slow the adoption of formal citations for computing resources. PMID:28394907

Implementation of Grid Tier 2 and Tier 3 facilities on a Distributed OpenStack Cloud

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Limosani, Antonio; Boland, Lucien; Coddington, Paul; Crosby, Sean; Huang, Joanna; Sevior, Martin; Wilson, Ross; Zhang, Shunde

2014-06-01

The Australian Government is making a AUD 100 million investment in Compute and Storage for the academic community. The Compute facilities are provided in the form of 30,000 CPU cores located at 8 nodes around Australia in a distributed virtualized Infrastructure as a Service facility based on OpenStack. The storage will eventually consist of over 100 petabytes located at 6 nodes. All will be linked via a 100 Gb/s network. This proceeding describes the development of a fully connected WLCG Tier-2 grid site as well as a general purpose Tier-3 computing cluster based on this architecture. The facility employs an extension to Torque to enable dynamic allocations of virtual machine instances. A base Scientific Linux virtual machine (VM) image is deployed in the OpenStack cloud and automatically configured as required using Puppet. Custom scripts are used to launch multiple VMs, integrate them into the dynamic Torque cluster and to mount remote file systems. We report on our experience in developing this nation-wide ATLAS and Belle II Tier 2 and Tier 3 computing infrastructure using the national Research Cloud and storage facilities.

LAGUNA DESIGN STUDY, Underground infrastructures and engineering

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nuijten, Guido Alexander

2011-07-01

The European Commission has awarded the LAGUNA project a grant of 1.7 million euro for a Design Study from the seventh framework program of research and technology development (FP7-INFRASTRUCTURES - 2007-1) in 2008. The purpose of this two year work is to study the feasibility of the considered experiments and prepare a conceptual design of the required underground infrastructure. It is due to deliver a report that allows the funding agencies to decide on the realization of the experiment and to select the site and the technology. The result of this work is the first step towards fulfilling the goals of LAGUNA. The work will continue with EU funding to study the possibilities more thoroughly. The LAGUNA project is included in the future plans prepared by European funding organizations. (Astroparticle physics in Europe). It is recommended that a new large European infrastructure is put forward, as a future international multi-purpose facility for improved studies on proton decay and low-energy neutrinos from astrophysical origin. The three detection techniques being studied for such large detectors in Europe, Water-Cherenkov (like MEMPHYS), liquid scintillator (like LENA) and liquid argon (like GLACIER), are evaluated in the context of a common design study which should also address the underground infrastructure and the possibility of an eventual detection of future accelerator neutrino beams. The design study is also to take into account worldwide efforts and converge, on a time scale of 2010, to a common proposal.

NASA Langley's AirSTAR Testbed: A Subscale Flight Test Capability for Flight Dynamics and Control System Experiments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jordan, Thomas L.; Bailey, Roger M.

2008-01-01

As part of the Airborne Subscale Transport Aircraft Research (AirSTAR) project, NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) has developed a subscaled flying testbed in order to conduct research experiments in support of the goals of NASA s Aviation Safety Program. This research capability consists of three distinct components. The first of these is the research aircraft, of which there are several in the AirSTAR stable. These aircraft range from a dynamically-scaled, twin turbine vehicle to a propeller driven, off-the-shelf airframe. Each of these airframes carves out its own niche in the research test program. All of the airplanes have sophisticated on-board data acquisition and actuation systems, recording, telemetering, processing, and/or receiving data from research control systems. The second piece of the testbed is the ground facilities, which encompass the hardware and software infrastructure necessary to provide comprehensive support services for conducting flight research using the subscale aircraft, including: subsystem development, integrated testing, remote piloting of the subscale aircraft, telemetry processing, experimental flight control law implementation and evaluation, flight simulation, data recording/archiving, and communications. The ground facilities are comprised of two major components: (1) The Base Research Station (BRS), a LaRC laboratory facility for system development, testing and data analysis, and (2) The Mobile Operations Station (MOS), a self-contained, motorized vehicle serving as a mobile research command/operations center, functionally equivalent to the BRS, capable of deployment to remote sites for supporting flight tests. The third piece of the testbed is the test facility itself. Research flights carried out by the AirSTAR team are conducted at NASA Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. The UAV Island runway is a 50 x 1500 paved runway that lies within restricted airspace at Wallops Flight Facility. The facility provides all the necessary infrastructure to conduct the research flights in a safe and efficient manner. This paper gives a comprehensive overview of the development of the AirSTAR testbed.

Applications of UAVs for Remote Sensing of Critical Infrastructure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wegener, Steve; Brass, James; Schoenung, Susan

2003-01-01

The surveillance of critical facilities and national infrastructure such as waterways, roadways, pipelines and utilities requires advanced technological tools to provide timely, up to date information on structure status and integrity. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are uniquely suited for these tasks, having large payload and long duration capabilities. UAVs also have the capability to fly dangerous and dull missions, orbiting for 24 hours over a particular area or facility providing around the clock surveillance with no personnel onboard. New UAV platforms and systems are becoming available for commercial use. High altitude platforms are being tested for use in communications, remote sensing, agriculture, forestry and disaster management. New payloads are being built and demonstrated onboard the UAVs in support of these applications. Smaller, lighter, lower power consumption imaging systems are currently being tested over coffee fields to determine yield and over fires to detect fire fronts and hotspots. Communication systems that relay video, meteorological and chemical data via satellite to users on the ground in real-time have also been demonstrated. Interest in this technology for infrastructure characterization and mapping has increased dramatically in the past year. Many of the UAV technological developments required for resource and disaster monitoring are being used for the infrastructure and facility mapping activity. This paper documents the unique contributions from NASA;s Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology (ERAST) program to these applications. ERAST is a UAV technology development effort by a consortium of private aeronautical companies and NASA. Details of demonstrations of UAV capabilities currently underway are also presented.

EUDAT: A New Cross-Disciplinary Data Infrastructure For Science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lecarpentier, Damien; Michelini, Alberto; Wittenburg, Peter

2013-04-01

In recent years significant investments have been made by the European Commission and European member states to create a pan-European e-Infrastructure supporting multiple research communities. As a result, a European e-Infrastructure ecosystem is currently taking shape, with communication networks, distributed grids and HPC facilities providing European researchers from all fields with state-of-the-art instruments and services that support the deployment of new research facilities on a pan-European level. However, the accelerated proliferation of data - newly available from powerful new scientific instruments, simulations and the digitization of existing resources - has created a new impetus for increasing efforts and investments in order to tackle the specific challenges of data management, and to ensure a coherent approach to research data access and preservation. EUDAT is a pan-European initiative that started in October 2011 and which aims to help overcome these challenges by laying out the foundations of a Collaborative Data Infrastructure (CDI) in which centres offering community-specific support services to their users could rely on a set of common data services shared between different research communities. Although research communities from different disciplines have different ambitions and approaches - particularly with respect to data organization and content - they also share many basic service requirements. This commonality makes it possible for EUDAT to establish common data services, designed to support multiple research communities, as part of this CDI. During the first year, EUDAT has been reviewing the approaches and requirements of a first subset of communities from linguistics (CLARIN), solid earth sciences (EPOS), climate sciences (ENES), environmental sciences (LIFEWATCH), and biological and medical sciences (VPH), and shortlisted four generic services to be deployed as shared services on the EUDAT infrastructure. These services are data replication from site to site, data staging to compute facilities, metadata, and easy storage. A number of enabling services such as distributed authentication and authorization, persistent identifiers, hosting of services, workspaces and centre registry were also discussed. The services being designed in EUDAT will thus be of interest to a broad range of communities that lack their own robust data infrastructures, or that are simply looking for additional storage and/or computing capacities to better access, use, re-use, and preserve their data. The first pilots were completed in 2012 and a pre-production ready operational infrastructure, comprised of five sites (RZG, CINECA, SARA, CSC, FZJ), offering 480TB of online storage and 4PB of near-line (tape) storage, initially serving four user communities (ENES, EPOS, CLARIN, VPH) was established. These services shall be available to all communities in a production environment by 2014. Although EUDAT has initially focused on a subset of research communities, it aims to engage with other communities interested in adapting their solutions or contributing to the design of the infrastructure. Discussions with other research communities - belonging to the fields of environmental sciences, biomedical science, physics, social sciences and humanities - have already begun and are following a pattern similar to the one we adopted with the initial communities. The next step will consist of integrating representatives from these communities into the existing pilots and task forces so as to include them in the process of designing the services and, ultimately, shaping the future CDI.

Challenges in integrating multidisciplinary data into a single e-infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Atakan, Kuvvet; Jeffery, Keith G.; Bailo, Daniele; Harrison, Matthew

2015-04-01

The European Plate Observing System (EPOS) aims to create a pan-European infrastructure for solid Earth science to support a safe and sustainable society. The mission of EPOS is to monitor and understand the dynamic and complex Earth system by relying on new e-science opportunities and integrating diverse and advanced Research Infrastructures in Europe for solid Earth Science. EPOS will enable innovative multidisciplinary research for a better understanding of the Earth's physical and chemical processes that control earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, ground instability and tsunami as well as the processes driving tectonics and Earth's surface dynamics. EPOS will improve our ability to better manage the use of the subsurface of the Earth. Through integration of data, models and facilities EPOS will allow the Earth Science community to make a step change in developing new concepts and tools for key answers to scientific and socio-economic questions concerning geo-hazards and geo-resources as well as Earth sciences applications to the environment and to human welfare. EPOS is now getting into its Implementation Phase (EPOS-IP). One of the main challenges during the implementation phase is the integration of multidisciplinary data into a single e-infrastructure. Multidisciplinary data are organized and governed by the Thematic Core Services (TCS) and are driven by various scientific communities encompassing a wide spectrum of Earth science disciplines. TCS data, data products and services will be integrated into a platform "the ICS system" that will ensure their interoperability and access to these services by the scientific community as well as other users within the society. This requires dedicated tasks for interactions with the various TCS-WPs, as well as the various distributed ICS (ICS-Ds), such as High Performance Computing (HPC) facilities, large scale data storage facilities, complex processing and visualization tools etc. Computational Earth Science (CES) services are identified as a transversal activity and as such need to be harmonized and provided within the ICS. In order to develop a metadata catalogue and the ICS system, the content from the entire spectrum of services included in TCS, ICS-Ds as well as CES activities, need to be organized in a systematic manner taking into account global and European IT-standards, while complying with the user needs and data provider requirements.

Chemical and Biological Defense: Designated Entity Needed to Identify, Align, and Manage DOD’s Infrastructure

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-06-01

Designated Leader, GAO-10-645 (Washington, D.C.: June 30, 2010). 35See GAO, Biological Defense: DOD Has Strengthened Coordination on Medical... on track to be designated a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design facility. metabolic poisons, and pulmonary toxicants; nerve agent...CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL DEFENSE Designated Entity Needed to Identify, Align, and Manage DOD’s Infrastructure

Geographic Hotspots of Critical National Infrastructure.

PubMed

Thacker, Scott; Barr, Stuart; Pant, Raghav; Hall, Jim W; Alderson, David

2017-12-01

Failure of critical national infrastructures can result in major disruptions to society and the economy. Understanding the criticality of individual assets and the geographic areas in which they are located is essential for targeting investments to reduce risks and enhance system resilience. Within this study we provide new insights into the criticality of real-life critical infrastructure networks by integrating high-resolution data on infrastructure location, connectivity, interdependence, and usage. We propose a metric of infrastructure criticality in terms of the number of users who may be directly or indirectly disrupted by the failure of physically interdependent infrastructures. Kernel density estimation is used to integrate spatially discrete criticality values associated with individual infrastructure assets, producing a continuous surface from which statistically significant infrastructure criticality hotspots are identified. We develop a comprehensive and unique national-scale demonstration for England and Wales that utilizes previously unavailable data from the energy, transport, water, waste, and digital communications sectors. The testing of 200,000 failure scenarios identifies that hotspots are typically located around the periphery of urban areas where there are large facilities upon which many users depend or where several critical infrastructures are concentrated in one location. © 2017 Society for Risk Analysis.

Cost Comparison in 2015 Dollars for Radioisotope Power Systems -- Cassini and Mars Science Laboratory

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Werner, James Elmer; Johnson, Stephen Guy; Dwight, Carla Chelan

Radioisotope power systems (RPSs) have enabled missions requiring reliable, long-lasting power in remote, harsh environments such as space since the early 1960s. Costs for RPSs are high, but are often misrepresented due to the complexity of space missions and inconsistent charging practices among the many and changing participant organizations over the years. This paper examines historical documentation associated with two past successful flight missions, each with a different RPS design, to provide a realistic cost basis for RPS production and deployment. The missions and their respective RPSs are Cassini, launched in 1997, that uses the general purpose heat source (GPHS)more » radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG), and Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), launched in 2011, that uses the multi-mission RTG (MMRTG). Actual costs in their respective years are discussed for each of the two RTG designs and the missions they enabled, and then present day values to 2015 are computed to compare the costs. Costs for this analysis were categorized into two areas: development of the specific RTG technology, and production and deployment of an RTG. This latter category includes material costs for the flight components (including Pu-238 and fine weave pierced fabric (FWPF)); manufacturing of flight components; assembly, testing, and transport of the flight RTG(s); ground operations involving the RTG(s) through launch; nuclear safety analyses for the launch and for the facilities housing the RTG(s) during all phases of ground operations; DOE’s support for NEPA analyses; and radiological contingency planning. This analysis results in a fairly similar 2015 normalized cost for the production and deployment of an RTG—approximately $118M for the GPHS-RTG and $109M for the MMRTG. In addition to these two successful flight missions, the costs for development of the MMRTG are included to serve as a future reference. Note that development costs included herein for the MMRTG do not include costs from NASA staff or facilities for their development efforts—they only include the amounts costed by DOE and DOE contractors. The 2015 value for MMRTG development is $83M. Both of the RPS types analyzed herein use the general purpose heat source (GPHS) module as the “heart of the RPS.” The estimates presented herein do not include development costs for the GPHS. These estimates also do not include the RPS infrastructure cost to maintain the facilities, equipment, and personnel necessary to enable the production of RPSs, except to the extent that the infrastructure is utilized during the production campaigns to provide RPSs for missions. It was not until after the Cassini mission that an RPS infrastructure funding structure was defined and funded separately from mission-specific elements. The information presented herein could allow for more accurate budget planning estimates for space missions being considered over the next decade and beyond.« less

Access to water and sanitation facilities in primary schools: A neglected educational crisis in Ngamiland district in Botswana

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ngwenya, B. N.; Thakadu, O. T.; Phaladze, N. A.; Bolaane, B.

2018-06-01

In developing countries, the sanitation and hygiene provision often receives limited resources compared to the water supply. However, water supply benefits tend to diminish if improved sanitation and hygiene are neglected. This paper presents findings of a situational analysis of water supply, sanitation and hygiene infrastructure and their utilization in three primary schools in north-western Botswana. The overall objective of the paper is to determine access and functionality of water supply, sanitation and hygiene infrastructure in three primary schools. The specific objectives are: a) Learners' perspective of their water and sanitation facilities and b) gendered utilization of sanitation and hygiene facilities. Data were collected through a face-to-face administered social survey tool to 286 learners selected through proportionate stratified random sampling from three purposively selected villages in the middle and lower Okavango Delta. Findings indicate that standpipes provide 96% of potable water supply. However, the majority (65% of leaners) indicated that they 'sometimes' experienced water shortage due to dry/nonfunctioning taps/pumps and leaks/wastage. Overall, schools have relatively sufficient sanitation facilities consisting of both water borne toilets and VIP latrines. The major sanitation gap identified was that 80% flush toilets hardly work, while 77% of VIP toilets were in disrepair. Furthermore, poor water supply compromised hand washing with 65.7% learners "always" washing their hands if school standpipes had water, while the majority did not wash hands if standpipes were dry. The study concluded that availability of sanitation infrastructure does not necessarily translate into utilization in the study area due to multiple problems, such as lack of personal hygiene supplies (regular toilet paper and hand washing detergents), privacy issues and recurring water problems. The chronicity of inadequate water, sanitation and hygiene infrastructure in primary schools is critical and there is urgent need to address these challenges in order to create a conducive learning environment in primary schools in the district.

Cyberinfrastructure for the NSF Ocean Observatories Initiative

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Orcutt, J. A.; Vernon, F. L.; Arrott, M.; Chave, A.; Schofield, O.; Peach, C.; Krueger, I.; Meisinger, M.

2008-12-01

The Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) is an environmental observatory covering a diversity of oceanic environments, ranging from the coastal to the deep ocean. The physical infrastructure comprises a combination of seafloor cables, buoys and autonomous vehicles. It is currently in the final design phase, with construction planned to begin in mid-2010 and deployment phased over five years. The Consortium for Ocean Leadership manages this Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction program with subcontracts to Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of Washington and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. High-level requirements for the CI include the delivery of near-real-time data with minimal latencies, open data, data analysis and data assimilation into models, and subsequent interactive modification of the network (including autonomous vehicles) by the cyberinfrastructure. Network connections include a heterogeneous combination of fiber optics, acoustic modems, and Iridium satellite telemetry. The cyberinfrastructure design loosely couples services that exist throughout the network and share common software and middleware as necessary. In this sense, the system appears to be identical at all scales, so it is self-similar or fractal by design. The system provides near-real-time access to data and developed knowledge by the OOI's Education and Public Engagement program, to the physical infrastructure by the marine operators and to the larger community including scientists, the public, schools and decision makers. Social networking is employed to facilitate the virtual organization that builds, operates and maintains the OOI as well as providing a variety of interfaces to the data and knowledge generated by the program. We are working closely with NOAA to exchange near-real-time data through interfaces to their Data Interchange Facility (DIF) program within the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS). Efficiencies have been emphasized through the use of university and commercial computing clouds.

Blueprint for Tomorrow: Redesigning Schools for Student-Centered Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nair, Prakash

2014-01-01

The United States has about $2 trillion tied up in aging school facilities. School districts throughout the country spend about $12 billion every year keeping this infrastructure going. Yet almost all of the new money we pour into school facilities reinforces an existing--and obsolete--model of schooling. In "Blueprint for Tomorrow,"…

Designs for Success: Massive Building Project Makes LACCD a Leader in Green Facilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

LaVista, Daniel

2010-01-01

After a 35-year building hiatus, the nine colleges in the Los Angeles Community College District (LACCD) needed a major facelift. Facilities on LACCD campuses were antiquated and had fallen into disrepair. For years, students voiced dismay, saying their campuses resembled high schools rather than colleges. Inadequate infrastructure drove many…

The Sanford Science Education Center: Addressing Key Design Challenges in Sharing Complex Science with Diverse Audiences

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Inverness Research, 2016

2016-01-01

In facilities throughout the United States and abroad, communities of scientists share infrastructure, instrumentation, and equipment to conduct scientific research. In these large facilities--laboratories, accelerators, telescope arrays, and research vessels--scientists are researching key questions that have the potential to make a significant…

Grids and clouds in the Czech NGI

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kundrát, Jan; Adam, Martin; Adamová, Dagmar; Chudoba, Jiří; Kouba, Tomáš; Lokajíček, Miloš; Mikula, Alexandr; Říkal, Václav; Švec, Jan; Vohnout, Rudolf

2016-09-01

There are several infrastructure operators within the Czech Republic NGI (National Grid Initiative) which provide users with access to high-performance computing facilities over a grid and cloud interface. This article focuses on those where the primary author has personal first-hand experience. We cover some operational issues as well as the history of these facilities.

The Employment of Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants in U.S. Nursing Homes

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Intrator, Orna; Feng, Zhanlian; Mor, Vince; Gifford, David; Bourbonniere, Meg; Zinn, Jacqueline

2005-01-01

Purpose: Nursing facilities with nurse practitioners or physician assistants (NPs or PAs) have been reported to provide better care to residents. Assuming that freestanding nursing homes in urban areas that employ these professionals are making an investment in medical infrastructure, we test the hypotheses that facilities in states with higher…

The Age of the Supercomputer Gives Way to the Age of the Super Infrastructure.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Young, Jeffrey R.

1997-01-01

In October 1997, the National Science Foundation will discontinue financial support for two university-based supercomputer facilities to concentrate resources on partnerships led by facilities at the University of California, San Diego and the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. The reconfigured program will develop more user-friendly and…

Transportation of Large Wind Components: A Review of Existing Geospatial Data

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mooney, Meghan; Maclaurin, Galen

2016-09-01

This report features the geospatial data component of a larger project evaluating logistical and infrastructure requirements for transporting oversized and overweight (OSOW) wind components. The goal of the larger project was to assess the status and opportunities for improving the infrastructure and regulatory practices necessary to transport wind turbine towers, blades, and nacelles from current and potential manufacturing facilities to end-use markets. The purpose of this report is to summarize existing geospatial data on wind component transportation infrastructure and to provide a data gap analysis, identifying areas for further analysis and data collection.

Access to emergency and surgical care in sub-Saharan Africa: the infrastructure gap.

PubMed

Hsia, Renee Y; Mbembati, Naboth A; Macfarlane, Sarah; Kruk, Margaret E

2012-05-01

The effort to increase access to emergency and surgical care in low-income countries has received global attention. While most of the literature on this issue focuses on workforce challenges, it is critical to recognize infrastructure gaps that hinder the ability of health systems to make emergency and surgical care a reality. This study reviews key barriers to the provision of emergency and surgical care in sub-Saharan Africa using aggregate data from the Service Provision Assessments and Demographic and Health Surveys of five countries: Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. For hospitals and health centres, competency was assessed in six areas: basic infrastructure, equipment, medicine storage, infection control, education and quality control. Percentage of compliant facilities in each country was calculated for each of the six areas to facilitate comparison of hospitals and health centres across the five countries. The percentage of hospitals with dependable running water and electricity ranged from 22% to 46%. In countries analysed, only 19-50% of hospitals had the ability to provide 24-hour emergency care. For storage of medication, only 18% to 41% of facilities had unexpired drugs and current inventories. Availability of supplies to control infection and safely dispose of hazardous waste was generally poor (less than 50%) across all facilities. As few as 14% of hospitals (and as high as 76%) among those surveyed had training and supervision in place. No surveyed hospital had enough infrastructure to follow minimum standards and practices that the World Health Organization has deemed essential for the provision of emergency and surgical care. The countries where these hospitals are located may be representative of other low-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Thus, the results suggest that increased attention to building up the infrastructure within struggling health systems is necessary for improvements in global access to medical care.

LifeWatch - a Large-scale eScience Infrastructure to Assist in Understanding and Managing our Planet's Biodiversity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hernández Ernst, Vera; Poigné, Axel; Los, Walter

2010-05-01

Understanding and managing the complexity of the biodiversity system in relation to global changes concerning land use and climate change with their social and economic implications is crucial to mitigate species loss and biodiversity changes in general. The sustainable development and exploitation of existing biodiversity resources require flexible and powerful infrastructures offering, on the one hand, the access to large-scale databases of observations and measures, to advanced analytical and modelling software, and to high performance computing environments and, on the other hand, the interlinkage of European scientific communities among each others and with national policies. The European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) selected the "LifeWatch e-science and technology infrastructure for biodiversity research" as a promising development to construct facilities to contribute to meet those challenges. LifeWatch collaborates with other selected initiatives (e.g. ICOS, ANAEE, NOHA, and LTER-Europa) to achieve the integration of the infrastructures at landscape and regional scales. This should result in a cooperating cluster of such infrastructures supporting an integrated approach for data capture and transmission, data management and harmonisation. Besides, facilities for exploration, forecasting, and presentation using heterogeneous and distributed data and tools should allow the interdisciplinary scientific research at any spatial and temporal scale. LifeWatch is an example of a new generation of interoperable research infrastructures based on standards and a service-oriented architecture that allow for linkage with external resources and associated infrastructures. External data sources will be established data aggregators as the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) for species occurrences and other EU Networks of Excellence like the Long-Term Ecological Research Network (LTER), GMES, and GEOSS for terrestrial monitoring, the MARBEF network for marine data, and the Consortium for European Taxonomic Facilities (CETAF) and its European Distributed Institute for Taxonomy (EDIT) for taxonomic data. But also "smaller" networks and "volunteer scientists" may send data (e.g. GPS supported species observations) to a LifeWatch repository. Autonomous operating wireless environmental sensors and other smart hand-held devices will contribute to increase data capture activities. In this way LifeWatch will directly underpin the development of GEOBON, the biodiversity component if GEOSS, the Global Earth observation System. To overcome all major technical difficulties imposed by the variety of currently and future technologies, protocols, data formats, etc., LifeWatch will define and use common open interfaces. For this purpose, the LifeWatch Reference Model was developed during the preparatory phase specifying the service-oriented architecture underlying the ICT-infrastructure. The Reference Model identifies key requirements and key architectural concepts to support workflows for scientific in-silico experiments, tracking of provenance, and semantic enhancement, besides meeting the functional requirements mentioned before. It provides guidelines for the specification and implementation of services and information models, defining as well a number of generic services and models. Another key issue addressed by the Reference Model is that the cooperation of many developer teams residing in many European countries has to be organized to obtain compatible results in that conformance with the specifications and policies of the Reference Model will be required. The LifeWatch Reference Model is based on the ORCHESTRA Reference Model for geospatial-oriented architectures and services networks that provides a generic framework and has been endorsed as best practice by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC). The LifeWatch Infrastructure will allow (interdisciplinary) scientific researchers to collaborate by creating e-Laboratories or by composing e-Services which can be shared and jointly developed. For it a long-term vision for the LifeWatch Biodiversity Workbench Portal has been developed as a one-stop application for the LifeWatch infrastructure based on existing and emerging technologies. There the user can find all available resources such as data, workflows, tools, etc. and access LifeWatch applications that integrate different resource and provides key capabilities like resource discovery and visualisation, creation of workflows, creation and management of provenance, and the support of collaborative activities. While LifeWatch developers will construct components for solving generic LifeWatch tasks, users may add their own facilities to fulfil individual needs. Examples for application of the LifeWatch Reference Model and the LifeWatch Biodiversity Workbench Portal will be given.

Impact of extreme weather events and climate change for health and social care systems.

PubMed

Curtis, Sarah; Fair, Alistair; Wistow, Jonathan; Val, Dimitri V; Oven, Katie

2017-12-05

This review, commissioned by the Research Councils UK Living With Environmental Change (LWEC) programme, concerns research on the impacts on health and social care systems in the United Kingdom of extreme weather events, under conditions of climate change. Extreme weather events considered include heatwaves, coldwaves and flooding. Using a structured review method, we consider evidence regarding the currently observed and anticipated future impacts of extreme weather on health and social care systems and the potential of preparedness and adaptation measures that may enhance resilience. We highlight a number of general conclusions which are likely to be of international relevance, although the review focussed on the situation in the UK. Extreme weather events impact the operation of health services through the effects on built, social and institutional infrastructures which support health and health care, and also because of changes in service demand as extreme weather impacts on human health. Strategic planning for extreme weather and impacts on the care system should be sensitive to within country variations. Adaptation will require changes to built infrastructure systems (including transport and utilities as well as individual care facilities) and also to institutional and social infrastructure supporting the health care system. Care sector organisations, communities and individuals need to adapt their practices to improve resilience of health and health care to extreme weather. Preparedness and emergency response strategies call for action extending beyond the emergency response services, to include health and social care providers more generally.

Sustainable infrastructure system modeling under uncertainties and dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Yongxi

Infrastructure systems support human activities in transportation, communication, water use, and energy supply. The dissertation research focuses on critical transportation infrastructure and renewable energy infrastructure systems. The goal of the research efforts is to improve the sustainability of the infrastructure systems, with an emphasis on economic viability, system reliability and robustness, and environmental impacts. The research efforts in critical transportation infrastructure concern the development of strategic robust resource allocation strategies in an uncertain decision-making environment, considering both uncertain service availability and accessibility. The study explores the performances of different modeling approaches (i.e., deterministic, stochastic programming, and robust optimization) to reflect various risk preferences. The models are evaluated in a case study of Singapore and results demonstrate that stochastic modeling methods in general offers more robust allocation strategies compared to deterministic approaches in achieving high coverage to critical infrastructures under risks. This general modeling framework can be applied to other emergency service applications, such as, locating medical emergency services. The development of renewable energy infrastructure system development aims to answer the following key research questions: (1) is the renewable energy an economically viable solution? (2) what are the energy distribution and infrastructure system requirements to support such energy supply systems in hedging against potential risks? (3) how does the energy system adapt the dynamics from evolving technology and societal needs in the transition into a renewable energy based society? The study of Renewable Energy System Planning with Risk Management incorporates risk management into its strategic planning of the supply chains. The physical design and operational management are integrated as a whole in seeking mitigations against the potential risks caused by feedstock seasonality and demand uncertainty. Facility spatiality, time variation of feedstock yields, and demand uncertainty are integrated into a two-stage stochastic programming (SP) framework. In the study of Transitional Energy System Modeling under Uncertainty, a multistage stochastic dynamic programming is established to optimize the process of building and operating fuel production facilities during the transition. Dynamics due to the evolving technologies and societal changes and uncertainty due to demand fluctuations are the major issues to be addressed.

U.S. Geological Survey Volcano Hazards Program—Assess, forecast, prepare, engage

USGS Publications Warehouse

Stovall, Wendy K.; Wilkins, Aleeza M.; Mandeville, Charles W.; Driedger, Carolyn L.

2016-07-13

At least 170 volcanoes in 12 States and 2 territories have erupted in the past 12,000 years and have the potential to erupt again. Consequences of eruptions from U.S. volcanoes can extend far beyond the volcano’s immediate area. Many aspects of our daily life are vulnerable to volcano hazards, including air travel, regional power generation and transmission infrastructure, interstate transportation, port facilities, communications infrastructure, and public health. The U.S. Geological Survey has the Federal responsibility to issue timely warnings of potential volcanic activity to the affected populace and civil authorities. The Volcano Hazards Program (VHP) is funded to carry out that mission and does so through a combination of volcano monitoring, short-term warnings, research on how volcanoes work, and community education and outreach.

The Zadko Telescope: Exploring the Transient Universe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Coward, D. M.; Gendre, B.; Tanga, P.; Turpin, D.; Zadko, J.; Dodson, R.; Devogéle, M.; Howell, E. J.; Kennewell, J. A.; Boër, M.; Klotz, A.; Dornic, D.; Moore, J. A.; Heary, A.

2017-01-01

The Zadko telescope is a 1 m f/4 Cassegrain telescope, situated in the state of Western Australia about 80-km north of Perth. The facility plays a niche role in Australian astronomy, as it is the only meter class facility in Australia dedicated to automated follow-up imaging of alerts or triggers received from different external instruments/detectors spanning the entire electromagnetic spectrum. Furthermore, the location of the facility at a longitude not covered by other meter class facilities provides an important resource for time critical projects. This paper reviews the status of the Zadko facility and science projects since it began robotic operations in March 2010. We report on major upgrades to the infrastructure and equipment (2012-2014) that has resulted in significantly improved robotic operations. Second, we review the core science projects, which include automated rapid follow-up of gamma ray burst (GRB) optical afterglows, imaging of neutrino counterpart candidates from the ANTARES neutrino observatory, photometry of rare (Barbarian) asteroids, supernovae searches in nearby galaxies. Finally, we discuss participation in newly commencing international projects, including the optical follow-up of gravitational wave (GW) candidates from the United States and European GW observatory network and present first tests for very low latency follow-up of fast radio bursts. In the context of these projects, we outline plans for a future upgrade that will optimise the facility for alert triggered imaging from the radio, optical, high-energy, neutrino, and GW bands.

Life sciences utilization of Space Station Freedom

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chambers, Lawrence P.

1992-01-01

Space Station Freedom will provide the United States' first permanently manned laboratory in space. It will allow, for the first time, long term systematic life sciences investigations in microgravity. This presentation provides a top-level overview of the planned utilization of Space Station Freedom by NASA's Life Sciences Division. The historical drivers for conducting life sciences research on a permanently manned laboratory in space as well as the advantages that a space station platform provides for life sciences research are discussed. This background information leads into a description of NASA's strategy for having a fully operational International Life Sciences Research Facility by the year 2000. Achieving this capability requires the development of the five discipline focused 'common core' facilities. Once developed, these facilities will be brought to the space station during the Man-Tended Capability phase, checked out and brought into operation. Their delivery must be integrated with the Space Station Freedom manifest. At the beginning of Permanent Manned Capability, the infrastructure is expected to be completed and the Life Sciences Division's SSF Program will become fully operational. A brief facility description, anticipated launch date and a focused objective is provided for each of the life sciences facilities, including the Biomedical Monitoring and Countermeasures (BMAC) Facility, Gravitational Biology Facility (GBF), Gas Grain Simulation Facility (GGSF), Centrifuge Facility (CF), and Controlled Ecological Life Support System (CELSS) Test Facility. In addition, hardware developed by other NASA organizations and the SSF International Partners for an International Life Sciences Research Facility is also discussed.

Microgravity Science Glovebox (MSG)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1998-01-01

The Microgravity Science Glovebox is a facility for performing microgravity research in the areas of materials, combustion, fluids and biotechnology science. The facility occupies a full ISPR, consisting of: the ISPR rack and infrastructure for the rack, the glovebox core facility, data handling, rack stowage, outfitting equipment, and a video subsystem. MSG core facility provides the experiment developers a chamber with air filtering and recycling, up to two levels of containment, an airlock for transfer of payload equipment to/from the main volume, interface resources for the payload inside the core facility, resources inside the airlock, and storage drawers for MSG support equipment and consumables.

Microgravity

NASA Image and Video Library

1998-05-01

The Microgravity Science Glovebox is a facility for performing microgravity research in the areas of materials, combustion, fluids and biotechnology science. The facility occupies a full ISPR, consisting of: the ISPR rack and infrastructure for the rack, the glovebox core facility, data handling, rack stowage, outfitting equipment, and a video subsystem. MSG core facility provides the experiment developers a chamber with air filtering and recycling, up to two levels of containment, an airlock for transfer of payload equipment to/from the main volume, interface resources for the payload inside the core facility, resources inside the airlock, and storage drawers for MSG support equipment and consumables.

Shadows of Stuxnet: Recommendations for U.S. Policy on Critical Infrastructure Cyber Defense Derived from the Stuxnet Attack

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-03-01

wastewater, oil and natural gas, chemical, transportation, pharmaceutical, pulp and paper, food and beverage, and discrete manufacturing (e.g...dams, energy infrastructure, banks, farms, food processing facilities, hospitals, nuclear reactors, transportation carriers, and water treatment... food and agriculture sector” is, “almost entirely under private ownership and is comprised of an estimated 2.2 million farms, 900,000 restaurants, and

MFC Communications Infrastructure Study

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Michael Cannon; Terry Barney; Gary Cook

2012-01-01

Unprecedented growth of required telecommunications services and telecommunications applications change the way the INL does business today. High speed connectivity compiled with a high demand for telephony and network services requires a robust communications infrastructure.   The current state of the MFC communication infrastructure limits growth opportunities of current and future communication infrastructure services. This limitation is largely due to equipment capacity issues, aging cabling infrastructure (external/internal fiber and copper cable) and inadequate space for telecommunication equipment. While some communication infrastructure improvements have been implemented over time projects, it has been completed without a clear overall plan and technology standard.more »   This document identifies critical deficiencies with the current state of the communication infrastructure in operation at the MFC facilities and provides an analysis to identify needs and deficiencies to be addressed in order to achieve target architectural standards as defined in STD-170. The intent of STD-170 is to provide a robust, flexible, long-term solution to make communications capabilities align with the INL mission and fit the various programmatic growth and expansion needs.« less

Airport Financing and User Charge Systems in the USA

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bartle, John R.

1998-01-01

This paper examines the financing of U.S. public airports in a turbulent era of change, and projects toward the future. It begins by briefly outlining historical patterns that have changed the industry, and airport facilities in particular. It then develops basic principles of public finance as applied to public infrastructure, followed by the applicable principles of management. Following that, the current airport financing system is analyzed and contrasted with a socially optimal financing system. A concluding section suggests policy reforms and their likely benefits. The principles of finance and management discussed here are elementary. However, their implications are radical for U.S. airport policy. There is a great deal of room to improve the allocation of aviation infrastructure resources. The application of these basic principles makes it evident that in many cases, current practice is wasteful, environmentally unsound, overly costly, and inequitable. Future investments in public aviation capital will continue to be wasteful until more efficient pricing systems are instituted. Thus, problem in the U.S. is not one of insufficient investment in airport infrastructure, but investment in the wrong types of infrastructure. In the U.S., the vast majority of publically-owned airports are owned by local governments. Thus, while the federal government bad a great deal of influence in financing airports, ultimately these are local decisions. The same is true with many other public infrastructure issues. Katz and Herman (1997) report that in 1995, U.S. net public capital stock equaled almost $4.6 trillion, 72% of which ($3.9 trillion) was owned by state and local governments, most of it in buildings, highways, Streets, sewer systems, and water supply facilities. Thus, public infrastructure finance is fundamentally a local government issue, with implications for federal and state governments in the design of their aid programs.

Bob Butt | NREL

Science.gov Websites

, testing, and commissioning of electrical infrastructure, facilities, and equipment. Education M.S ., Electrical Engineering, University of Arizona B.S., Electrical Engineering, University of Arizona

A Worldwide Web-portal for Aquatic Mesocosm Facilities: WWW.MESOCOSM.EU

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Berger, S. A.; Nejstgaard, J. C.

2016-02-01

Experimental mesocosms are valuable tools to fill the gap between highly controlled/replicated lab experiments and uncontrolled/non-replicated natural environments such as rivers, lakes and oceans. WWW.MESOCOSM.EU is an open web-portal for leading aquatic mesocosm facilities around the world. It was created within the FP7 EU-project MESOAQUA (A network of leading MESOcosm facilities to advance the studies of future AQUAtic ecosystems from the Arctic to the Mediterranean). The goal of the portal is to increase international knowledge about existing mesocosm facilities, including information on locations, environment, equipment, contacts, research opportunities and mesocosm-based publications. MESOCOSM.EU specifically aims to be a tool to enhance the quality of research by facilitating international cooperative network building, announcement of new research initiatives, transfer of best practice, and dissemination of knowledge, public information and press releases. As an open platform for all aquatic ecosystem scale science (marine and freshwater), MESOCOSM.EU aims to fill the lack of a centralized, coordinating virtual infrastructure for international aquatic mesocosm research, from the mountains to the ocean and from polar to tropical regions.

Life Cycle Cost Analysis of Ready Mix Concrete Plant

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Topkar, V. M.; Duggar, A. R.; Kumar, A.; Bonde, P. P.; Girwalkar, R. S.; Gade, S. B.

2013-11-01

India, being a developing nation is experiencing major growth in its infrastructural sector. Concrete is the major component in construction. The requirement of good quality of concrete in large quantities can be fulfilled by ready mix concrete batching and mixing plants. The paper presents a technique of applying the value engineering tool life cycle cost analysis to a ready mix concrete plant. This will help an investor or an organization to take investment decisions regarding a ready mix concrete facility. No economic alternatives are compared in this study. A cost breakdown structure is prepared for the ready mix concrete plant. A market survey has been conducted to collect realistic costs for the ready mix concrete facility. The study establishes the cash flow for the ready mix concrete facility helpful in investment and capital generation related decisions. Transit mixers form an important component of the facility and are included in the calculations. A fleet size for transit mixers has been assumed for this purpose. The life cycle cost has been calculated for the system of the ready mix concrete plant and transit mixers.

An Assessment of Capital Budgeting Practices for Public Higher Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Manns, Derrick

2004-01-01

The capital renewal and replacement of the nation's public higher education facilities has been a growing problem for several decades. While the need for new and improved facilities has increased over the years, many campuses simply have too many aging infrastructures that are too costly to replace. This, at a time when we have less than …

TA 55 Reinvestment Project II Phase C Update Project Status May 23, 2017

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Giordano, Anthony P.

The TA-55 Reinvestment Project (TRP) II Phase C is a critical infrastructure project focused on improving safety and reliability of the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) TA-55 Complex. The Project recapitalizes and revitalizes aging and obsolete facility and safety systems providing a sustainable nuclear facility for National Security Missions.

Fire Hazard Assessment in Supporting Fire Protection System Design of a Chemical Process Facility

DTIC Science & Technology

1996-08-01

CSDP/Studies/FireHaz –i– 3/28/97 FIRE HAZARD ASSESSMENT IN SUPPORTING FIRE PROTECTION SYSTEM DESIGN OF A CHEMICAL PROCESS FACILITY Ali Pezeshk...Joseph Chang, Dwight Hunt, and Peter Jahn Parsons Infrastructure & Technology Group, Inc. Pasadena, California 91124 ABSTRACT Because fires in a chemical ...Assessment in Supporting Fire Protection System Design of a Chemical Process Facility 5a. CONTRACT NUMBER 5b. GRANT NUMBER 5c. PROGRAM ELEMENT NUMBER 6

Factors associated with place of death in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

PubMed

Anteneh, Aderaw; Araya, Tekebash; Misganaw, Awoke

2013-03-26

Dying at home is highly prevalent in Africa partly due to lack of accessibility of modern health services. In turn, limited infrastructure and health care deliveries in Africa complicate access to health services. A weak infrastructure and limited health facilities with lower quality in Ethiopia resulted poor health service utilization and coverage, high morbidity and mortality rates. We examined whether people in Addis Ababa died in health facilities and investigated the basic factors associated with place of death. We used verbal autopsy data of 4,776 adults (age>14 years) for the years 2006-2010 from the Addis Ababa Mortality Surveillance Program (AAMSP). The main data source of AAMSP is the burial surveillance from all cemeteries in Addis Ababa. We provide descriptive statistics of place of adult deaths and discussed their covariates using multivariate analyses. Only 28.7% died at health facilities, while the remaining died out of health facilities. There was an increase trend in the proportion of health facility deaths from 25.3% in 2006 to 32.5% in 2010. The risk of health facility death versus out of health facility deaths decreased with age. Compared with those who had no education educated people were more likely to die at health facilities. The chance of in health facility death was a little higher for females than males while religion, occupational status and ethnicity of the deceased had no any significance difference in place of death. Both demographic and social factors determine where adults will die in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The majority of people in Addis Ababa died out of health facilities. The health system should also give special attention to the emerging non communicable diseases like cancer for effective treatment of patients.

Factors associated with place of death in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Dying at home is highly prevalent in Africa partly due to lack of accessibility of modern health services. In turn, limited infrastructure and health care deliveries in Africa complicate access to health services. A weak infrastructure and limited health facilities with lower quality in Ethiopia resulted poor health service utilization and coverage, high morbidity and mortality rates. We examined whether people in Addis Ababa died in health facilities and investigated the basic factors associated with place of death. Methods We used verbal autopsy data of 4,776 adults (age>14 years) for the years 2006–2010 from the Addis Ababa Mortality Surveillance Program (AAMSP). The main data source of AAMSP is the burial surveillance from all cemeteries in Addis Ababa. We provide descriptive statistics of place of adult deaths and discussed their covariates using multivariate analyses. Results Only 28.7% died at health facilities, while the remaining died out of health facilities. There was an increase trend in the proportion of health facility deaths from 25.3% in 2006 to 32.5% in 2010. The risk of health facility death versus out of health facility deaths decreased with age. Compared with those who had no education educated people were more likely to die at health facilities. The chance of in health facility death was a little higher for females than males while religion, occupational status and ethnicity of the deceased had no any significance difference in place of death. Conclusion Both demographic and social factors determine where adults will die in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The majority of people in Addis Ababa died out of health facilities. The health system should also give special attention to the emerging non communicable diseases like cancer for effective treatment of patients. PMID:23530478

International Microgravity Plasma Facility IMPF: A Multi-User Modular Research Facility for Complex Plasma Research on ISS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seurig, R.; Burfeindt, J.; Castegini, R.; Griethe, W.; Hofmann, P.

2002-01-01

On March 03, 2001, the PKE-Nefedov plasma experiment was successfully put into operation on board ISS. This complex plasma experiment is the predecessor for the semi-autonomous multi-user facility IMPF (International Microgravity Plasma Facility) to be flown in 2006 with an expected operational lifetime of 10 years. IMPF is envisioned to be an international research facility for investigators in the field of multi-component plasmas containing ions, electrons, and charged microparticles. This research filed is often referred to as "complex plasmas". The actual location of IMPF on ISS is not decided yet; potential infrastructure under consideration are EXPRESS Rack, Standard Interface Rack SIR, European Drawer Rack EDR, or a to be designed custom rack infrastructure on the Russian Segment. The actual development status of the DLR funded Pre-phase B Study for IMPF will be presented. For this phase, IMPF was assumed to be integrated in an EXPRESS Rack requiring four middeck lockers with two 4-PU ISIS drawers for accommodation. Technical and operational challenges, like a 240 Mbytes/sec continuous experimental data stream for 60 minutes, will be addressed. The project was funded by the German Space Agency (DLR) and was performed in close cooperation with scientists from the Max-Planck-Institute for Extraterrestical Physics in Munich, Germany.

Optimizing multimodality treatment for head and neck cancer in rural India.

PubMed

Trivedi, N P; Trivedi, P; Trivedi, H; Trivedi, S; Trivedi, N

2012-01-01

Multimodality treatment of head and neck cancer in rural India is not always feasible due to lack of infrastructure and logistics. To demonstrate the feasibility of multimodality treatment for head and neck cancer in a community setting in rural India. Community cancer center, retrospective review. This article focuses on practice environment in a cancer clinic in rural India. We evaluated patient profile, treatment protocols, infrastructure availability, factors impacting treatment decisions, cost estimations, completion of treatment, and major treatment-related complications for the patient population treated in our clinic for a 2-year period. A total of 230 head and neck cancer patients were treated with curative intent. Infrastructure support included basic operating room facility (cautery machine, suction, drill system, microscope, and anesthesia machine without ventilator support), blood bank, histopathology laboratory, and computerized tomography machine. Radiation therapy (RT) facility was available in a nearby city, about 75 km away. One hundred and fifty-four (67%) patients presented at an advanced stage, with 138 (60%) receiving multimodality treatment. One hundred and eighty-four (80%) patients underwent primary surgery and 167 (73%) received radiotherapy. Two hundred and twelve (92%) patients completed the treatment, 60 (26%) were lost to follow-up at 18-month median follow-up (range 12-26 months), with 112 patients (66%) being alive, disease free. Totally 142 were major head neck surgeries with 25 free flap reconstructions and 41 regional flaps. There were 15 (6%) major post-op complications and two perioperative mortalities. Average cost of treatment for single modality treatment was approximately 40,000 INR and for multimodality treatment was 80,000 INR. This study demonstrates that it is feasible to provide basic multimodality treatment to head and neck cancer patients in the community.

Barriers to providing quality emergency obstetric care in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: Healthcare providers' perspectives on training, referrals and supervision, a mixed methods study.

PubMed

Austin, Anne; Gulema, Hanna; Belizan, Maria; Colaci, Daniela S; Kendall, Tamil; Tebeka, Mahlet; Hailemariam, Mengistu; Bekele, Delayehu; Tadesse, Lia; Berhane, Yemane; Langer, Ana

2015-03-29

Increasing women's access to and use of facilities for childbirth is a critical national strategy to improve maternal health outcomes in Ethiopia; however coverage alone is not enough as the quality of emergency obstetric services affects maternal mortality and morbidity. Addis Ababa has a much higher proportion of facility-based births (82%) than the national average (11%), but timely provision of quality emergency obstetric care remains a significant challenge for reducing maternal mortality and improving maternal health. The purpose of this study was to assess barriers to the provision of emergency obstetric care in Addis Ababa from the perspective of healthcare providers by analyzing three factors: implementation of national referral guidelines, staff training, and staff supervision. A mixed methods approach was used to assess barriers to quality emergency obstetric care. Qualitative analyses included twenty-nine, semi-structured, key informant interviews with providers from an urban referral network consisting of a hospital and seven health centers. Quantitative survey data were collected from 111 providers, 80% (111/138) of those providing maternal health services in the same referral network. Respondents identified a lack of transportation and communication infrastructure, overcrowding at the referral hospital, insufficient pre-service and in-service training, and absence of supportive supervision as key barriers to provision of quality emergency obstetric care. Dedicated transportation and communication infrastructure, improvements in pre-service and in-service training, and supportive supervision are needed to maximize the effective use of existing human resources and infrastructure, thus increasing access to and the provision of timely, high quality emergency obstetric care in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

NASA Ames Sustainability Initiatives: Aeronautics, Space Exploration, and Sustainable Futures

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grymes, Rosalind A.

2015-01-01

In support of the mission-specific challenges of aeronautics and space exploration, NASA Ames produces a wealth of research and technology advancements with significant relevance to larger issues of planetary sustainability. NASA research on NexGen airspace solutions and its development of autonomous and intelligent technologies will revolutionize both the nation's air transporation systems and have applicability to the low altitude flight economy and to both air and ground transporation, more generally. NASA's understanding of the Earth as a complex of integrated systems contributes to humanity's perception of the sustainability of our home planet. Research at NASA Ames on closed environment life support systems produces directly applicable lessons on energy, water, and resource management in ground-based infrastructure. Moreover, every NASA campus is a 'city'; including an urbanscape and a workplace including scientists, human relations specialists, plumbers, engineers, facility managers, construction trades, transportation managers, software developers, leaders, financial planners, technologists, electricians, students, accountants, and even lawyers. NASA is applying the lessons of our mission-related activities to our urbanscapes and infrastructure, and also anticipates a leadership role in developing future environments for living and working in space.

Department of Energy's Virtual Lab Infrastructure for Integrated Earth System Science Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Williams, D. N.; Palanisamy, G.; Shipman, G.; Boden, T.; Voyles, J.

2014-12-01

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Biological and Environmental Research (BER) Climate and Environmental Sciences Division (CESD) produces a diversity of data, information, software, and model codes across its research and informatics programs and facilities. This information includes raw and reduced observational and instrumentation data, model codes, model-generated results, and integrated data products. Currently, most of this data and information are prepared and shared for program specific activities, corresponding to CESD organization research. A major challenge facing BER CESD is how best to inventory, integrate, and deliver these vast and diverse resources for the purpose of accelerating Earth system science research. This talk provides a concept for a CESD Integrated Data Ecosystem and an initial roadmap for its implementation to address this integration challenge in the "Big Data" domain. Towards this end, a new BER Virtual Laboratory Infrastructure will be presented, which will include services and software connecting the heterogeneous CESD data holdings, and constructed with open source software based on industry standards, protocols, and state-of-the-art technology.

Grids, virtualization, and clouds at Fermilab

DOE PAGES

Timm, S.; Chadwick, K.; Garzoglio, G.; ...

2014-06-11

Fermilab supports a scientific program that includes experiments and scientists located across the globe. To better serve this community, in 2004, the (then) Computing Division undertook the strategy of placing all of the High Throughput Computing (HTC) resources in a Campus Grid known as FermiGrid, supported by common shared services. In 2007, the FermiGrid Services group deployed a service infrastructure that utilized Xen virtualization, LVS network routing and MySQL circular replication to deliver highly available services that offered significant performance, reliability and serviceability improvements. This deployment was further enhanced through the deployment of a distributed redundant network core architecture andmore » the physical distribution of the systems that host the virtual machines across multiple buildings on the Fermilab Campus. In 2010, building on the experience pioneered by FermiGrid in delivering production services in a virtual infrastructure, the Computing Sector commissioned the FermiCloud, General Physics Computing Facility and Virtual Services projects to serve as platforms for support of scientific computing (FermiCloud 6 GPCF) and core computing (Virtual Services). Lastly, this work will present the evolution of the Fermilab Campus Grid, Virtualization and Cloud Computing infrastructure together with plans for the future.« less

Grids, virtualization, and clouds at Fermilab

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Timm, S.; Chadwick, K.; Garzoglio, G.; Noh, S.

2014-06-01

Fermilab supports a scientific program that includes experiments and scientists located across the globe. To better serve this community, in 2004, the (then) Computing Division undertook the strategy of placing all of the High Throughput Computing (HTC) resources in a Campus Grid known as FermiGrid, supported by common shared services. In 2007, the FermiGrid Services group deployed a service infrastructure that utilized Xen virtualization, LVS network routing and MySQL circular replication to deliver highly available services that offered significant performance, reliability and serviceability improvements. This deployment was further enhanced through the deployment of a distributed redundant network core architecture and the physical distribution of the systems that host the virtual machines across multiple buildings on the Fermilab Campus. In 2010, building on the experience pioneered by FermiGrid in delivering production services in a virtual infrastructure, the Computing Sector commissioned the FermiCloud, General Physics Computing Facility and Virtual Services projects to serve as platforms for support of scientific computing (FermiCloud 6 GPCF) and core computing (Virtual Services). This work will present the evolution of the Fermilab Campus Grid, Virtualization and Cloud Computing infrastructure together with plans for the future.

Study of sandy soil grain-size distribution on its deformation properties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Antropova, L. B.; Gruzin, A. V.; Gildebrandt, M. I.; Malaya, L. D.; Nikulina, V. B.

2018-04-01

As a rule, new oil and gas fields' development faces the challenges of providing construction objects with material and mineral resources, for example, medium sand soil for buildings and facilities footings of the technological infrastructure under construction. This problem solution seems to lie in a rational usage of the existing environmental resources, soils included. The study was made of a medium sand soil grain-size distribution impact on its deformation properties. Based on the performed investigations, a technique for controlling sandy soil deformation properties was developed.

Evaluation Program on the Implementation of Industrial Apprenticeship (Prakerin) in Electrical Engineering

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maulana, I.; Sumarto; Nurafiati, P.; Puspita, R. H.

2018-02-01

This research aims to find out the evaluation program of the Industrial apprenticeship (Prakerin) in electrical engineering. This research includes on four variables of CIPP. (1). Context (a). programme planning (b). design. (2). Input (a). readiness of students (b). performance of vocational education teachers (c). Facilities and infrastructure, (3). process (a). performance students (b). performance mentors, (4). Product (a). readiness of student work. This research is a type of program evaluation research with Stake model approach. Data collection methods used are questionnaires with closed questions and frequently asked questions.

Hospital water and opportunities for infection prevention

PubMed Central

Decker, Brooke K.; Palmore, Tara N.

2017-01-01

Nosocomial waterborne pathogens may reach patients through several modes of transmission. Colonization of healthcare facility waterworks can occur in the proximal infrastructure, in the distal water outlets, or both. Infections with waterborne organisms such as Legionella, mycobacteria, Pseudomonas, and others cause significant morbidity and mortality, particularly in immunocomprised patients. Hospitals should have prospective water safety plans that include preventive measures, as prevention is preferable to remediation of contaminated hospital water distribution system. Whole genome sequencing may provide more informative epidemiologic data to link patient infections with hospital water isolates. PMID:25217106

A quantitative analysis of surgical capacity in Santa Cruz, Bolivia.

PubMed

Markin, Abraham; Barbero, Roxana; Leow, Jeffrey J; Groen, Reinou S; Skow, Evan J; Apelgren, Keith N; Kushner, Adam L; Nwomeh, Benedict C

2013-11-01

This investigation aimed to document surgical capacity at public medical centers in a middle-income Latin American country using the Surgeons OverSeas (SOS) Personnel, Infrastructure, Procedures, Equipment, and Supplies (PIPES) survey tool. We applied the PIPES tool at six urban and 25 rural facilities in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Outcome measures included the availability of items in five domains (Personnel, Infrastructure, Procedures, Equipment, and Supplies) and the PIPES index. PIPES indices were calculated by summing scores from each domain, dividing by the total number of survey items, and multiplying by 10. Thirty-one of the 32 public facilities that provide surgical care in Santa Cruz were assessed. Santa Cruz had at least 7.8 surgeons and 2.8 anesthesiologists per 100,000 population. However, these providers were unequally distributed, such that nine rural sites had no anesthesiologist. Few rural facilities had blood banking (4/25), anesthesia machines (11/25), postoperative care (11/25), or intensive care units (1/25). PIPES indices ranged from 5.7-13.2, and were significantly higher in urban (median 12.6) than rural (median 7.8) areas (P < 0.01). This investigation is novel in its application of a Spanish-language version of the PIPES tool in a middle-income Latin American country. These data document substantially greater surgical capacity in Santa Cruz than has been reported for Sierra Leone or Rwanda, consistent with Bolivia's development status. Unfortunately, surgeons are limited in rural areas by deficits in anesthesia and perioperative services. These results are currently being used to target local quality improvement initiatives. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

National Aeronautics Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) Infrastructure Plan

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-01-01

addressed in the National Aeronautics R&D Plan, identi- fying unnecessary redundancy solely on the basis of infrastructure required to support H H13 ...near, mid, and far terms, and impact not only scramjet propulsion systems, but potential turbine-based combined cycle systems as well. Turbine Engine...Icing Test Facilities A greater understanding of the impact that icing conditions have on turbine engine opera- tions is needed to develop enhanced

An integrated approach to infrastructure.

PubMed

Hayes, Stewart

2010-02-01

In an edited version of a paper presented at the IHEA (Institute of Hospital Engineering Australia) 60th National Conference 2009, Stewart Hayes, principal consultant at Jakeman Business Solutions, argues that, with "traditional" means of purchasing and maintaining critical hospital infrastructure systems "becoming less viable", a more integrated, strategic approach to procuring and providing essential hospital services that looks not just to the present, but equally to the facility's anticipated future needs, is becoming ever more important.

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2014

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2014-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2014 : (NTAD2014) is a set of nationwide geographic datasets of : transportation facilities, transportation networks, associated : infrastructure, and other political and administrative entities. : These da...

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2015

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2015-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2015 : (NTAD2015) is a set of nationwide geographic datasets of : transportation facilities, transportation networks, associated : infrastructure, and other political and administrative entities. : These da...

Critical Infrastructure for Ocean Research and Societal Needs in 2030

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Glickson, D.; Barron, E. J.; Fine, R. A.; Bellingham, J. G.; Boss, E.; Boyle, E. A.; Edwards, M.; Johnson, K. S.; Kelley, D. S.; Kite-Powell, H.; Ramberg, S. E.; Rudnick, D. L.; Schofield, O.; Tamburri, M.; Wiebe, P. H.; Wright, D. J.; Committee on an Ocean Infrastructure StrategyU. S. Ocean Research in 2030

2011-12-01

At the request of the Subcommittee on Ocean Science and Technology, an expert committee was convened by the National Research Council to identify major research questions anticipated to be at the forefront of ocean science in 2030, define categories of infrastructure that should be included in planning, provide advice on criteria and processes that could be used to set priorities, and recommend ways to maximize the value of investments in ocean infrastructure. The committee identified 32 future ocean research questions in four themes: enabling stewardship of the environment, protecting life and property, promoting economic vitality, and increasing fundamental scientific understanding. Many of the questions reflect challenging, multidisciplinary science questions that are clearly relevant now and are likely to take decades to solve. U.S. ocean research will require a growing suite of ocean infrastructure for a range of activities, such as high quality, sustained time series observations and autonomous monitoring at a broad range of spatial and temporal scales. A coordinated national plan for making future strategic investments will be needed and should be based upon known priorities and reviewed every 5-10 years. After assessing trends in ocean infrastructure and technology development, the committee recommended implementing a comprehensive, long-term research fleet plan in order to retain access to the sea; continuing U.S. capability to access fully and partially ice-covered seas; supporting innovation, particularly the development of biogeochemical sensors; enhancing computing and modeling capacity and capability; establishing broadly accessible data management facilities; and increasing interdisciplinary education and promoting a technically-skilled workforce. They also recommended that development, maintenance, or replacement of ocean research infrastructure assets should be prioritized in terms of societal benefit. Particular consideration should be given to usefulness for addressing important science questions; affordability, efficiency, and longevity; and ability to contribute to other missions or applications. Estimating the economic costs and benefits of each potential infrastructure investment using these criteria would allow funding of investments that produce the largest expected net benefit over time.

Progress In Developing An In-Pile Acoustically Telemetered Sensor Infrastructure

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smith, James A.; Garrett, Steven L.; Heibel, Michael D.

2016-09-01

A salient grand challenge for a number of Department of Energy programs such as Fuels Cycle Research and Development ( includes Accident Tolerant Fuel research and the Transient Reactor Test Facility Restart experiments), Light Water Sustainability, and Advanced Reactor Technologies is to enhance our fundamental understanding of fuel and materials behavior under irradiation. Robust and accurate in-pile measurements will be instrumental to develop and validate a computationally predictive multi-scale understanding of nuclear fuel and materials. This sensing technology will enable the linking of fundamental micro-structural evolution mechanisms to the macroscopic degradation of fuels and materials. The in situ sensors andmore » measurement systems will monitor local environmental parameters as well as characterize microstructure evolution during irradiation. One of the major road blocks in developing practical robust, and cost effective in-pile sensor systems, are instrument leads. If a wireless telemetry infrastructure can be developed for in-pile use, in-core measurements would become more attractive and effective. Thus to be successful in accomplishing effective in-pile sensing and microstructure characterization an interdisciplinary measurement infrastructure needs to be developed in parallel with key sensing technology. For the discussion in this research, infrastructure is defined as systems, technology, techniques, and algorithms that may be necessary in the delivery of beneficial and robust data from in-pile devices. The architecture of a system’s infrastructure determines how well it operates and how flexible it is to meet future requirements. The limiting path for the effective deployment of the salient sensing technology will not be the sensors themselves but the infrastructure that is necessary to communicate data from in-pile to the outside world in a non-intrusive and reliable manner. This article gives a high level overview of a promising telemetry infrastructure based on acoustic wireless transmission of data that is being developed and tested by the INL, Penn State and Westinghouse.« less

Elastic extension of a local analysis facility on external clouds for the LHC experiments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ciaschini, V.; Codispoti, G.; Rinaldi, L.; Aiftimiei, D. C.; Bonacorsi, D.; Calligola, P.; Dal Pra, S.; De Girolamo, D.; Di Maria, R.; Grandi, C.; Michelotto, D.; Panella, M.; Taneja, S.; Semeria, F.

2017-10-01

The computing infrastructures serving the LHC experiments have been designed to cope at most with the average amount of data recorded. The usage peaks, as already observed in Run-I, may however originate large backlogs, thus delaying the completion of the data reconstruction and ultimately the data availability for physics analysis. In order to cope with the production peaks, the LHC experiments are exploring the opportunity to access Cloud resources provided by external partners or commercial providers. In this work we present the proof of concept of the elastic extension of a local analysis facility, specifically the Bologna Tier-3 Grid site, for the LHC experiments hosted at the site, on an external OpenStack infrastructure. We focus on the Cloud Bursting of the Grid site using DynFarm, a newly designed tool that allows the dynamic registration of new worker nodes to LSF. In this approach, the dynamically added worker nodes instantiated on an OpenStack infrastructure are transparently accessed by the LHC Grid tools and at the same time they serve as an extension of the farm for the local usage.

Commisioning and ``First-Light'' of the Willard L. Eccles Observatory at Frisco Peak

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Springer, Wayne; Dawson, Kyle; Ricketts, Paul; Ramsrud, Nicolas; Samarasingha, Upul

2010-10-01

The University of Utah completed construction of the Willard L. Eccles Observatory located on Frisco Peak near Milford, Utah in October 2009. The observatory site is located on a prominent peak at an altitude of approximately 9600 feet in a region with minimal light pollution. The Frisco Peak site was chosen after careful consideration of many factors including climate, light pollution and available infrastructure. The facility houses a 32'' Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope manufactured by DFM Engineering of Longmont, CO. Commissioning and development of remote operation capabilities is currently being undertaken. Monitoring of the weather and seeing conditions are being performed and confirm the excellent nature of the site for astronomical observations. The observatory facilities will be used for educational and public outreach activities as well as research projects. A description of the facility and its planned use will be provided. Measurements of the ``seeing'' and night sky background from images obtained with the telescope will also be presented.

Healthcare worker and family caregiver hand hygiene in Bangladeshi healthcare facilities: results from the Bangladesh National Hygiene Baseline Survey

PubMed Central

Horng, L.M.; Unicomb, L.; Alam, M.-U.; Halder, A.K.; Shoab, A.K.; Ghosh, P.K.; Opel, A.; Islam, M.K.; Luby, S.P.

2017-01-01

SUMMARY Background Healthcare facility hand hygiene impacts patient care, healthcare worker safety, and infection control, but low-income countries have few data to guide interventions. Aim To conduct a nationally representative survey of hand hygiene infrastructure and behaviour in Bangladeshi healthcare facilities to establish baseline data to aid policy. Methods The 2013 Bangladesh National Hygiene Baseline Survey examined water, sanitation, and hand hygiene across households, schools, restaurants and food vendors, traditional birth attendants, and healthcare facilities. We used probability proportional to size sampling to select 100 rural and urban population clusters, and then surveyed hand hygiene infrastructure in 875 inpatient healthcare facilities, observing behaviour in 100 facilities. Findings More than 96% of facilities had ‘improved’ water sources, but environmental contamination occurred frequently around water sources. Soap was available at 78–92% of handwashing locations for doctors and nurses, but just 4–30% for patients and family. Only 2% of 4676 hand hygiene opportunities resulted in recommended actions: using alcohol sanitizer or washing both hands with soap, then drying by air or clean cloth. Healthcare workers performed recommended hand hygiene in 9% of 919 opportunities: more after patient contact (26%) than before (11%). Family caregivers frequently washed hands with only water (48% of 2751 opportunities), but with little soap (3%). Conclusion Healthcare workers had more access to hand hygiene materials and performed better hand hygiene than family, but still had low adherence. Increasing hand hygiene materials and behaviour could improve infection control in Bangladeshi health-care facilities. PMID:27665311

Healthcare worker and family caregiver hand hygiene in Bangladeshi healthcare facilities: results from the Bangladesh National Hygiene Baseline Survey.

PubMed

Horng, L M; Unicomb, L; Alam, M-U; Halder, A K; Shoab, A K; Ghosh, P K; Opel, A; Islam, M K; Luby, S P

2016-11-01

Healthcare facility hand hygiene impacts patient care, healthcare worker safety, and infection control, but low-income countries have few data to guide interventions. To conduct a nationally representative survey of hand hygiene infrastructure and behaviour in Bangladeshi healthcare facilities to establish baseline data to aid policy. The 2013 Bangladesh National Hygiene Baseline Survey examined water, sanitation, and hand hygiene across households, schools, restaurants and food vendors, traditional birth attendants, and healthcare facilities. We used probability proportional to size sampling to select 100 rural and urban population clusters, and then surveyed hand hygiene infrastructure in 875 inpatient healthcare facilities, observing behaviour in 100 facilities. More than 96% of facilities had 'improved' water sources, but environmental contamination occurred frequently around water sources. Soap was available at 78-92% of handwashing locations for doctors and nurses, but just 4-30% for patients and family. Only 2% of 4676 hand hygiene opportunities resulted in recommended actions: using alcohol sanitizer or washing both hands with soap, then drying by air or clean cloth. Healthcare workers performed recommended hand hygiene in 9% of 919 opportunities: more after patient contact (26%) than before (11%). Family caregivers frequently washed hands with only water (48% of 2751 opportunities), but with little soap (3%). Healthcare workers had more access to hand hygiene materials and performed better hand hygiene than family, but still had low adherence. Increasing hand hygiene materials and behaviour could improve infection control in Bangladeshi healthcare facilities. Copyright © 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

National Transportation Atlas Databases : 2013

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2013-01-01

The National Transportation Atlas Databases 2013 (NTAD2013) is a set of nationwide geographic datasets of transportation facilities, transportation networks, associated infrastructure, and other political and administrative entities. These datasets i...

A new vision of the post-NIST civil infrastructure program: the challenges of next-generation construction materials and processes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, H. Felix; Wan, Yan

2014-03-01

Our nation's infrastructural systems are crumbling. The deteriorating process grows over time. The physical aging of these vital facilities and the remediation of their current critical state pose a key societal challenge to the United States. Current sensing technologies, while well developed in controlled laboratory environments, have not yet yielded tools for producing real-time, in-situ data that are adequately comprehensible for infrastructure decision-makers. The need for advanced sensing technologies is national because every municipality and state in the nation faces infrastructure management challenges. The need is critical because portions of infrastructure are reaching the end of their life-spans and there are few cost-effective means to monitor infrastructure integrity and to prioritize the renovation and replacement of infrastructure elements. New advanced sensing technologies that produce cost-effective inspection and real-time monitoring data, and that can also help or aid in meaningful interpretation of the acquired data, therefore will enhance the safety in regard to the public on structural integrity by issuing timely and accurate alert data for effective maintenance to avoid disasters happening. New advanced sensing technologies also allow more informed management of infrastructural investments by avoiding premature replacement of infrastructure and identifying those structures in need of immediate action to prevent from catastrophic failure. Infrastructure management requires that once a structural defect is detected, an economical and efficient repair be made. Advancing the technologies of repairing infrastructure elements in contact with water, road salt, and subjected to thermal changes requires innovative research to significantly extend the service life of repairs, lower the costs of repairs, and provide repair technologies that are suitable for a wide range of conditions. All these new technologies will provide increased lifetimes, security, and safety of elements of critical infrastructure for the Nation's already deteriorating civil infrastructure. It is envisioned that the Nation should look far beyond: not only should we efficiently and effectively address current problems of the aging infrastructure, but we must also further develop next-generation construction materials and processes for new construction. To accomplish this ambitious goal, we must include process efficiency that will help select the most reliable and cost-effective materials in construction processes; performance and cost will be the prime consideration for selections construction materials based on life-cycle cost and materials performance; energy efficiency will drive reduced energy consumption from current levels by 50 % per unit of output; and environmental responsiveness will achieve net-zero waste from construction materials and its constituents. Should it be successfully implemented, we will transform the current 21st century infrastructure systems to enable the vital functioning of society and improve competitiveness of the economy to ensure that our quality of life remains high.

The NHERI RAPID Facility: Enabling the Next-Generation of Natural Hazards Reconnaissance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wartman, J.; Berman, J.; Olsen, M. J.; Irish, J. L.; Miles, S.; Gurley, K.; Lowes, L.; Bostrom, A.

2017-12-01

The NHERI post-disaster, rapid response research (or "RAPID") facility, headquartered at the University of Washington (UW), is a collaboration between UW, Oregon State University, Virginia Tech, and the University of Florida. The RAPID facility will enable natural hazard researchers to conduct next-generation quick response research through reliable acquisition and community sharing of high-quality, post-disaster data sets that will enable characterization of civil infrastructure performance under natural hazard loads, evaluation of the effectiveness of current and previous design methodologies, understanding of socio-economic dynamics, calibration of computational models used to predict civil infrastructure component and system response, and development of solutions for resilient communities. The facility will provide investigators with the hardware, software and support services needed to collect, process and assess perishable interdisciplinary data following extreme natural hazard events. Support to the natural hazards research community will be provided through training and educational activities, field deployment services, and by promoting public engagement with science and engineering. Specifically, the RAPID facility is undertaking the following strategic activities: (1) acquiring, maintaining, and operating state-of-the-art data collection equipment; (2) developing and supporting mobile applications to support interdisciplinary field reconnaissance; (3) providing advisory services and basic logistics support for research missions; (4) facilitating the systematic archiving, processing and visualization of acquired data in DesignSafe-CI; (5) training a broad user base through workshops and other activities; and (6) engaging the public through citizen science, as well as through community outreach and education. The facility commenced operations in September 2016 and will begin field deployments beginning in September 2018. This poster will provide an overview of the vision for the RAPID facility, the equipment that will be available for use, the facility's operations, and opportunities for user training and facility use.

Opportunities for Materials Science and Biological Research at the OPAL Research Reactor

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kennedy, S. J.

Neutron scattering techniques have evolved over more than 1/2 century into a powerful set of tools for determination of atomic and molecular structures. Modern facilities offer the possibility to determine complex structures over length scales from {approx}0.1 nm to {approx}500 nm. They can also provide information on atomic and molecular dynamics, on magnetic interactions and on the location and behaviour of hydrogen in a variety of materials. The OPAL Research Reactor is a 20 megawatt pool type reactor using low enriched uranium fuel, and cooled by water. OPAL is a multipurpose neutron factory with modern facilities for neutron beam research,more » radioisotope production and irradiation services. The neutron beam facility has been designed to compete with the best beam facilities in the world. After six years in construction, the reactor and neutron beam facilities are now being commissioned, and we will commence scientific experiments later this year. The presentation will include an outline of the strengths of neutron scattering and a description of the OPAL research reactor, with particular emphasis on it's scientific infrastructure. It will also provide an overview of the opportunities for research in materials science and biology that will be possible at OPAL, and mechanisms for accessing the facilities. The discussion will emphasize how researchers from around the world can utilize these exciting new facilities.« less

US-CERT Control System Center Input/Output (I/O) Conceputal Design

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Not Available

2005-02-01

This document was prepared for the US-CERT Control Systems Center of the National Cyber Security Division (NCSD) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS has been tasked under the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to coordinate the overall national effort to enhance the protection of the national critical infrastructure. Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-7 directs the federal departments to identify and prioritize critical infrastructure and protect it from terrorist attack. The US-CERT National Strategy for Control Systems Security was prepared by the NCSD to address the control system security component addressed in the National Strategy to Secure Cyberspace andmore » the National Strategy for the Physical Protection of Critical Infrastructures and Key Assets. The US-CERT National Strategy for Control Systems Security identified five high-level strategic goals for improving cyber security of control systems; the I/O upgrade described in this document supports these goals. The vulnerability assessment Test Bed, located in the Information Operations Research Center (IORC) facility at Idaho National Laboratory (INL), consists of a cyber test facility integrated with multiple test beds that simulate the nation's critical infrastructure. The fundamental mission of the Test Bed is to provide industry owner/operators, system vendors, and multi-agency partners of the INL National Security Division a platform for vulnerability assessments of control systems. The Input/Output (I/O) upgrade to the Test Bed (see Work Package 3.1 of the FY-05 Annual Work Plan) will provide for the expansion of assessment capabilities within the IORC facility. It will also provide capabilities to connect test beds within the Test Range and other Laboratory resources. This will allow real time I/O data input and communication channels for full replications of control systems (Process Control Systems [PCS], Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Systems [SCADA], and components). This will be accomplished through the design and implementation of a modular infrastructure of control system, communications, networking, computing and associated equipment, and measurement/control devices. The architecture upgrade will provide a flexible patching system providing a quick ''plug and play''configuration through various communication paths to gain access to live I/O running over specific protocols. This will allow for in-depth assessments of control systems in a true-to-life environment. The full I/O upgrade will be completed through a two-phased approach. Phase I, funded by DHS, expands the capabilities of the Test Bed by developing an operational control system in two functional areas, the Science & Technology Applications Research (STAR) Facility and the expansion of various portions of the Test Bed. Phase II (see Appendix A), funded by other programs, will complete the full I/O upgrade to the facility.« less

APPLICATION OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES IN MEDICAL EDUCATION

PubMed Central

Al-Tamimi, Dalal M.

2003-01-01

The recognition that information and communication technologies should play an increasingly important role in medical education is a key to educating physicians in the 21st century. Computer use in medical education includes, Internet hypermedia/multimedia technologies, medical informatics, distance learning and telemedicine. Adaptation to the use of these technologies should ideally start from the elementary school level. Medical schools must introduce medical informatics courses very early in the medical curriculum. Teachers will need regular CME courses to prepare and update themselves with the changing circumstances. Our infrastructure must be prepared for the new developments with computer labs, basic skill labs, close circuit television facilities, virtual class rooms, smart class rooms, simulated teaching facilities, and distance teaching by tele-techniques. Our existing manpower including, doctors, nurses, technicians, librarians, and administration personal require hands-on training, while new recruitment will have to emphasize compulsory knowledge of and familiarity with information technology. This paper highlights these subjects in detail as a means to prepare us to meet the challenges of the 21st century. PMID:23011983

Gaps in Capacity in Primary Care in Low-Resource Settings for Implementation of Essential Noncommunicable Disease Interventions

PubMed Central

Mendis, S.; Al Bashir, Igbal; Dissanayake, Lanka; Varghese, Cherian; Fadhil, Ibtihal; Marhe, Esha; Sambo, Boureima; Mehta, Firdosi; Elsayad, Hind; Sow, Idrisa; Algoe, Maltie; Tennakoon, Herbert; Truong, Lai Die; Lan, Le Thi Tuyet; Huiuinato, Dismond; Hewageegana, Neelamni; Fahal, Naiema A. W.; Mebrhatu, Goitom; Tshering, Gado; Chestnov, Oleg

2012-01-01

Objective. The objective was to evaluate the capacity of primary care (PC) facilities to implement basic interventions for prevention and management of major noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), including cardiovascular diseases and diabetes. Methods. A cross-sectional survey was done in eight low- and middle-income countries (Benin, Bhutan, Eritrea, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Syria, and Vietnam) in 90 PC facilities randomly selected. The survey included questions on the availability of human resources, equipment, infrastructure, medicines, utilization of services, financing, medical information, and referral systems. Results and Conclusions. Major deficits were identified in health financing, access to basic technologies and medicines, medical information systems, and the health workforce. The study has provided the foundation for strengthening PC to address noncommunicable diseases. There are important implications of the findings of this study for all low- and middle-income countries as capacity of PC is fundamental for equitable prevention and control of NCDs. PMID:23251789

Morpheus Lander Testing Campaign

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hart, Jeremy J.; Mitchell, Jennifer D.

2011-01-01

NASA s Morpheus Project has developed and tested a prototype planetary lander capable of vertical takeoff and landing designed to serve as a testbed for advanced spacecraft technologies. The Morpheus vehicle has successfully performed a set of integrated vehicle test flights including hot-fire and tether tests, ultimately culminating in an un-tethered "free-flight" This development and testing campaign was conducted on-site at the Johnson Space Center (JSC), less than one year after project start. Designed, developed, manufactured and operated in-house by engineers at JSC, the Morpheus Project represents an unprecedented departure from recent NASA programs and projects that traditionally require longer development lifecycles and testing at remote, dedicated testing facilities. This paper documents the integrated testing campaign, including descriptions of test types (hot-fire, tether, and free-flight), test objectives, and the infrastructure of JSC testing facilities. A major focus of the paper will be the fast pace of the project, rapid prototyping, frequent testing, and lessons learned from this departure from the traditional engineering development process at NASA s Johnson Space Center.

Large Payload Transportation and Test Considerations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rucker, Michelle A.; Pope, James C.

2011-01-01

Ironically, the limiting factor to a national heavy lift strategy may not be the rocket technology needed to throw a heavy payload, but rather the terrestrial infrastructure - roads, bridges, airframes, and buildings - necessary to transport, acceptance test, and process large spacecraft. Failure to carefully consider how large spacecraft are designed, and where they are manufactured, tested, or launched, could result in unforeseen cost to modify/develop infrastructure, or incur additional risk due to increased handling or elimination of key verifications. During test and verification planning for the Altair project, a number of transportation and test issues related to the large payload diameter were identified. Although the entire Constellation Program - including Altair - was canceled in the 2011 NASA budget, issues identified by the Altair project serve as important lessons learned for future payloads that may be developed to support national "heavy lift" strategies. A feasibility study performed by the Constellation Ground Operations (CxGO) project found that neither the Altair Ascent nor Descent Stage would fit inside available transportation aircraft. Ground transportation of a payload this large over extended distances is generally not permitted by most states, so overland transportation alone would not have been an option. Limited ground transportation to the nearest waterway may be permitted, but water transportation could take as long as 66 days per production unit, depending on point of origin and acceptance test facility; transportation from the western United States would require transit through the Panama Canal to access the Kennedy Space Center launch site. Large payloads also pose acceptance test and ground processing challenges. Although propulsion, mechanical vibration, and reverberant acoustic test facilities at NASA s Plum Brook Station have been designed to accommodate large spacecraft, special handling and test work-arounds may be necessary, which could increase cost, schedule, and technical risk. Once at the launch site, there are no facilities currently capable of accommodating the combination of large payload size and hazardous processing (which includes hypergolic fuels, pyrotechnic devices, and high pressure gasses).

How Physical Processes are Informing River Management Actions at Marble Bluff Dam, Truckee River, Nevada

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bountry, J.; Godaire, J.; Bradley, D. N.

2017-12-01

At the terminus of the Truckee River into Pyramid Lake (Nevada, USA), upstream river management actions have dramatically reshaped the river landscape, posing significant challenges for the management of endangered aquatic species and maintenance of existing infrastructure. Within the last 100 years, upstream water withdrawal for human uses has resulted in a rapid lowering of Pyramid Lake which initiated up to 90 ft of channel incision. In 1976 Marble Bluff Dam was constructed to halt the upstream progression of channel incision and protect upstream agricultural lands, tribal resources, and infrastructure. Since construction an additional 40 ft of lake lowering and subsequent channel lowering now poses a potential risk to the structural integrity of the dam. The dynamic downstream river combined with ongoing reservoir sedimentation pose challenges to fish passage facilities that enable migration of numerous endangered cui-ui and threatened Lahontan Cutthroat Trout (LCT) to upstream spawning areas each year. These facilities include a fish lock at the dam, a fish bypass channel which allows fish to avoid the shallow delta area during low lake levels, and a meandering channel constructed by the Nature Conservancy to connect the bypass channel to the receding Pyramid Lake. The reservoir formed by Marble Bluff Dam has completely filled with sediment which impacts fish passage facilities. The original operating manual for the dam recommends year-round flushing of sediment through radial gates, but this can no longer be accomplished. During critical fish migration periods in the spring operators must ensure fish entrance channels downstream of the dam are not buried with released sediment and fish are not trapped in a portion of the reservoir full of sediment that would risk sending them back over the dam. To help inform future reservoir sediment and infrastructure management strategies, we bracket a range of potential river responses to lake level lowering and floods using historical trends, current field data, and hydraulic and sediment transport models. We present options for adaptive management for dam and reservoir sediment operations that incorporates monitoring of river processes to inform annual implementation strategies along with long-term planning.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

MacDonald, Douglas G.; Clements, Samuel L.; Patrick, Scott W.

Securing high value and critical assets is one of the biggest challenges facing this nation and others around the world. In modern integrated systems, there are four potential modes of attack available to an adversary: • physical only attack, • cyber only attack, • physical-enabled cyber attack, • cyber-enabled physical attack. Blended attacks involve an adversary working in one domain to reduce system effectiveness in another domain. This enables the attacker to penetrate further into the overall layered defenses. Existing vulnerability assessment (VA) processes and software tools which predict facility vulnerabilities typically evaluate the physical and cyber domains separately. Vulnerabilitiesmore » which result from the integration of cyber-physical control systems are not well characterized and are often overlooked by existing assessment approaches. In this paper, we modified modification of the timely detection methodology, used for decades in physical security VAs, to include cyber components. The Physical and Cyber Risk Analysis Tool (PACRAT) prototype illustrates an integrated vulnerability assessment that includes cyber-physical interdependencies. Information about facility layout, network topology, and emplaced safeguards is used to evaluate how well suited a facility is to detect, delay, and respond to attacks, to identify the pathways most vulnerable to attack, and to evaluate how often safeguards are compromised for a given threat or adversary type. We have tested the PACRAT prototype on critical infrastructure facilities and the results are promising. Future work includes extending the model to prescribe the recommended security improvements via an automated cost-benefit analysis.« less

Water Infrastructure Needs and Investment: Review and Analysis of Key Issues

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-11-24

the Rural Development Act of 1972, as amended (7 U.S.C. § 1926). The purpose of these USDA programs is to provide basic amenities, alleviate health...nonregulatory costs (e.g., routine replacement of basic infrastructure).12 Wastewater Needs. The most recent wastewater survey, conducted in 2004 and issued...1.6 billion just to implement the most basic steps needed to improve security (such as better controlling access to facilities with fences, locks

Cloud computing can simplify HIT infrastructure management.

PubMed

Glaser, John

2011-08-01

Software as a Service (SaaS), built on cloud computing technology, is emerging as the forerunner in IT infrastructure because it helps healthcare providers reduce capital investments. Cloud computing leads to predictable, monthly, fixed operating expenses for hospital IT staff. Outsourced cloud computing facilities are state-of-the-art data centers boasting some of the most sophisticated networking equipment on the market. The SaaS model helps hospitals safeguard against technology obsolescence, minimizes maintenance requirements, and simplifies management.

National Ignition Facility Project: An Update

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hogan, W J; Moses, E; Warner, B

2000-12-07

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) consists of 192 forty-centimeter-square laser beams and a 10-m-diameter target chamber. Physical construction began in 1997. The Laser and Target Area Building and the Optics Assembly Building were the first major construction activities, and despite several unforeseen obstacles, the buildings are now 92% complete and have been done on time and within cost. Prototype component development and testing has proceeded in parallel. Optics vendors have installed full-scale production lines and have done prototype production runs. The assembly and integration of the beampath infrastructure has been reconsidered and a new approach has been developed. This papermore » will discuss the status of the NIF project and the plans for completion. It will also include summary information on Laser MegaJoule (LMJ) provided by M. Andre, LMJ Project Director.« less

The National Ignition Facility Project: An Update

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hogan, W.J.; Moses, E.; Warner, B.

2000-12-07

The National Ignition Facility (NIT) consists of 192 forty-centimeter-square laser beams and a 10-m-diameter target chamber. Physical construction began in 1997. The Laser and Target Area Building and the Optics Assembly Building were the first major construction activities, and despite several unforeseen obstacles, the buildings are now 92% complete and have been done on time and within cost. Prototype component development and testing has proceeded in parallel. Optics vendors have installed full-scale production lines and have done prototype production runs. The assembly and integration of the beam path infrastructure has been reconsidered and a new approach has been developed. Thismore » paper will discuss the status of the NIF project and the plans for completion. It will also include summary information on Laser MegaJoule (LMJ) provided by M. Andre, LMJ Project Director.« less

Sci—Fri PM: Topics — 03: The Global Task Force on Radiotherapy for Cancer Control: Core Investments

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Van Dyk, J.; Jaffray, D. A.; MacPherson, M. S.

The Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) is a membership-based, non-governmental organization with a mandate to “…to unite the cancer community to reduce the global cancer burden, to promote greater equity, and to integrate cancer control into the world health and development agenda.” COMP is an associate member of the UICC. It is well recognized by the UICC that there are major gaps between high, and low and middle income countries, in terms of access to cancer services including access to radiation therapy. In this context, the UICC has developed a Global Task Force on Radiotherapy for Cancer Control withmore » a charge to answer a single question: “What does it cost to close the gap between what exists today and reasonable access to radiotherapy globally?” The Task Force consists of leaders internationally recognized for their radiation treatment related expertise (radiation oncologists, medical physicists, radiation therapists) as well as those with global health and economics specialization. The Task Force has developed three working groups: (1) to look at the global burden of cancer; (2) to look at the infrastructure requirements (facilities, equipment, personnel); and (3) to consider outcomes in terms of numbers of lives saved and palliated patients. A report is due at the World Cancer Congress in December 2014. This presentation reviews the infrastructure considerations under analysis by the second work group. The infrastructure parameters being addressed include capital costs of buildings and equipment and operating costs, which include human resources, equipment servicing and quality control, and general overhead.« less

An Introduction to Architectural Surety(SM) Education

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Matalucci, R.V.; Miyoshi, D.S.

1998-09-01

This report describes the Sandia activities in the developing field management approach to enhancing National Laboratories (Sandia) educational outreach of architectural and infrastructure surety, a risk the safety, security, and reliability of facilities, systems, and structures. It begins with a description of the field of architectural and infrastmcture surety, including Sandia's historical expertise and experience in nuclear weapons surety. An overview of the 1996 Sandia Workshop on Architectural SuretysM is then provided to reference the initiation of the various activities. This workshop established the need for a surety education program at the University level and recommended that Sandia develop themore » course material as soon as possible. Technical material was assembled and the course was offered at the University of New Mexico (UNM) during the 1997 spring semester. The bulk of this report accordingly summarizes the lecture material presented in this pioneering graduate-level course on Infrastructure Surety in the Civil Engineering Department at UNM. This groundbreaking class presented subject matter developed by experts from Sandia, and included additional information from guest lecturers from academia, government, and industry. Also included in this report are summaries of the term projects developed by the graduate students, an overview of the 1997 International Conference on Architectural Suretp: Assuring the Performance of Buildings and Injiastruchwes (co-sponsored by Sandia, the American Institute of Architects, and the American Society of Civil Engineers), and recommendations for further course work development. The U.S. Department of Energy provides support to this emerging field of architectural and infrastructure surety and recognizes its broad application to developing government, industry, and professional standards in the national interest.« less

Chemical Facility Security Improvement Act of 2009

THOMAS, 111th Congress

Rep. Jackson-Lee, Sheila [D-TX-18

2009-01-07

House - 02/05/2009 Referred to the Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection. (All Actions) Tracker: This bill has the status IntroducedHere are the steps for Status of Legislation:

78 FR 16692 - Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS)

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-03-18

... Protection (IP), Infrastructure Security Compliance Division (ISCD) will submit the following Information... submissions of responses. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: CFATS Program Manager, DHS/NPPD/IP/ ISCD, [email protected

Climate Adaptation and Storms & Flooding

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

EPA works with drinking water, wastewater and stormwater utilities, as well as local, state and tribal governments to help critical water infrastructure facilities prepare for and recover from the impacts of climate change.

The European Research Infrastructure for Heritage Science (erihs)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Striova, J.; Pezzati, L.

2017-08-01

The European Research Infrastructure for Heritage Science (E-RIHS) entered the European strategic roadmap for research infrastructures (ESFRI Roadmap [1]) in 2016, as one of its six new projects. E-RIHS supports research on heritage interpretation, preservation, documentation and management. Both cultural and natural heritage are addressed: collections, artworks, buildings, monuments and archaeological sites. E-RIHS aims to become a distributed research infrastructure with a multi-level star-structure: facilities from single Countries will be organized in national nodes, coordinated by National Hubs. The E-RIHS Central Hub will provide the unique access point to all E-RIHS services through coordination of National Hubs. E-RIHS activities already started in some of its national nodes. In Italy the access to some E-RIHS services started in 2015. A case study concerning the diagnostic of a hypogea cave is presented.

Race/ethnicity and geographic access to Medicaid substance use disorder treatment facilities in the United States.

PubMed

Cummings, Janet R; Wen, Hefei; Ko, Michelle; Druss, Benjamin G

2014-02-01

Although substance use disorders (SUDs) are prevalent and associated with adverse consequences, treatment rates remain low. Unlike physical and mental health problems, treatment for SUDs is predominantly provided in a separate specialty sector and more heavily financed by public sources. Medicaid expansion under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has the potential to increase access to treatment for SUDs but only if an infrastructure exists to serve new enrollees. To examine the availability of outpatient SUD treatment facilities that accept Medicaid across US counties and whether counties with a higher percentage of racial/ethnic minorities are more likely to have gaps in this infrastructure. We used data from the 2009 National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment Services public use file and the 2011-2012 Area Resource file to examine sociodemographic factors associated with county-level access to SUD treatment facilities that serve Medicaid enrollees. Counties in all 50 states were included. We estimated a probit model with state indicators to adjust for state-level heterogeneity in demographics, politics, and policies. Independent variables assessed county racial/ethnic composition (ie, percentage black and percentage Hispanic), percentage living in poverty, percentage living in a rural area, percentage insured with Medicaid, percentage uninsured, and total population. Dichotomous indicator for counties with at least 1 outpatient SUD treatment facility that accepts Medicaid. Approximately 60% of US counties have at least 1 outpatient SUD facility that accepts Medicaid, although this rate is lower in many Southern and Midwestern states than in other areas of the country. Counties with a higher percentage of black (marginal effect [ME],  -3.1; 95% CI,  -5.2% to -0.9%), rural (-9.2%; -11.1% to -7.4%), and/or uninsured (-9.5%; -13.0% to -5.9%) residents are less likely to have one of these facilities. The potential for increasing access to SUD treatment via Medicaid expansion may be tempered by the local availability of facilities to provide care, particularly for counties with a high percentage of black and/or uninsured residents and for rural counties. Although states that opt in to the expansion will secure additional federal funds for the SUD treatment system, additional policies may need to be implemented to ensure that adequate geographic access exists across local communities to serve new enrollees.

Use of facility assessment data to improve reproductive health service delivery in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

PubMed Central

2009-01-01

Background Prolonged exposure to war has severely impacted the provision of health services in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Health infrastructure has been destroyed, health workers have fled and government support to health care services has been made difficult by ongoing conflict. Poor reproductive health (RH) indicators illustrate the effect that the prolonged crisis in DRC has had on the on the reproductive health (RH) of Congolese women. In 2007, with support from the RAISE Initiative, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and CARE conducted baseline assessments of public hospitals to evaluate their capacities to meet the RH needs of the local populations and to determine availability, utilization and quality of RH services including emergency obstetric care (EmOC) and family planning (FP). Methods Data were collected from facility assessments at nine general referral hospitals in five provinces in the DRC during March, April and November 2007. Interviews, observation and clinical record review were used to assess the general infrastructure, EmOC and FP services provided, and the infection prevention environment in each of the facilities. Results None of the nine hospitals met the criteria for classification as an EmOC facility (either basic or comprehensive). Most facilities lacked any FP services. Shortage of trained staff, essential supplies and medicines and poor infection prevention practices were consistently documented. All facilities had poor systems for routine monitoring of RH services, especially with regard to EmOC. Conclusions Women's lives can be saved and their well-being improved with functioning RH services. As the DRC stabilizes, IRC and CARE in partnership with the local Ministry of Health and other service provision partners are improving RH services by: 1) providing necessary equipment and renovations to health facilities; 2) improving supply management systems; 3) providing comprehensive competency-based training for health providers in RH and infection prevention; 4) improving referral systems to the hospitals; 5) advocating for changes in national RH policies and protocols; and 6) providing technical assistance for monitoring and evaluation of key RH indicators. Together, these initiatives will improve the quality and accessibility of RH services in the DRC - services which are urgently needed and to which Congolese women are entitled by international human rights law. PMID:20025757

Extreme Light Infrastructure - Nuclear Physics pillar (ELI-NP) : new horizons in physics with high power lasers and brilliant gamma beams.

PubMed

Gales, Sydney; Tanaka, Kazuo A; Balabanski, D L; Negoita, Florin; Stutman, D; Ur, Calin Alexander; Tesileanu, Ovidiu; Ursescu, Daniel; Ghita, Dan Gabriel; Andrei, I; Ataman, Stefan; Cernaianu, M O; D'Alessi, L; Dancus, I; Diaconescu, B; Djourelov, N; Filipescu, D; Ghenuche, P; Matei, C; Seto Kei, K; Zeng, M; Zamfir, Victor Nicolae

2018-06-28

The European Strategic Forum for Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) has selected in 2006 a proposal based on ultra-intense laser elds with intensities reaching up to 10221023 W/cm2 called \\ELI" for Extreme Light Infrastructure. The construction of a large-scale laser-centred, distributed pan-European research infrastructure, involving beyond the state-of-the-art ultra-short and ultra-intense laser technologies, received the approval for funding in 2011 2012. The three pillars of the ELI facility are being built in Czech Republic, Hungary and Romania. The Romanian pillar is ELI-Nuclear Physics (ELI-NP). The new facility is intended to serve a broad national, European and International science community. Its mission covers scientic research at the frontier of knowledge involving two domains. The rst one is laser-driven experiments related to nuclear physics, strong-eld quantum electrodynamics and associated vacuum eects. The second is based on a Comptonbackscattering high-brilliance and intense low-energy gamma beam (< 20 MeV), a marriage of laser and accelerator technology which will allow us to investigate nuclear structure and reactions as well as nuclear astrophysics with unprecedented resolution and accuracy. In addition to fundamental themes, a large number of applications with signicant societal impact are being developed. The ELI-NP research centre will be located in Magurele near Bucharest, Romania. The project is implemented by \\Horia Hulubei" National Institute for Physics and Nuclear Engineering (IFIN-HH). The project started in January 2013 and the new facility will be fully operational by the end of 2019. After a short introduction to multi-PW lasers and Multi-MeV brilliant gamma beam scientic and technical description of the future ELI-NP facility as well as the present status of its implementation of ELI-NP, will be presented. The science and examples of societal applications at reach with these new probes will be discussed with a special focus on day-one experiments and associated novel instrumentation. © 2018 IOP Publishing Ltd.

17 CFR 23.603 - Business continuity and disaster recovery.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-04-01

..., facilities, infrastructure, personnel and competencies essential to the continued operations of the swap.... The individuals identified shall be authorized to make key decisions on behalf of the swap dealer or...

17 CFR 23.603 - Business continuity and disaster recovery.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-04-01

..., facilities, infrastructure, personnel and competencies essential to the continued operations of the swap.... The individuals identified shall be authorized to make key decisions on behalf of the swap dealer or...

Continuing Chemical Facilities Antiterrorism Security Act of 2010

THOMAS, 111th Congress

Rep. Dent, Charles W. [R-PA-15

2010-04-29

House - 05/05/2010 Referred to the Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection. (All Actions) Tracker: This bill has the status IntroducedHere are the steps for Status of Legislation:

Chemical Facility Security Improvement Act of 2013

THOMAS, 113th Congress

Rep. Jackson Lee, Sheila [D-TX-18

2013-01-03

House - 02/12/2013 Referred to the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection, and Security Technologies. (All Actions) Tracker: This bill has the status IntroducedHere are the steps for Status of Legislation:

Development of a master health facility list in Nigeria.

PubMed

Makinde, Olusesan Ayodeji; Azeez, Aderemi; Bamidele, Samson; Oyemakinde, Akin; Oyediran, Kolawole Azeez; Adebayo, Wura; Fapohunda, Bolaji; Abioye, Abimbola; Mullen, Stephanie

2014-01-01

Abstract. Routine Health Information Systems (RHIS) are increasingly transitioning to electronic platforms in several developing countries. Establishment of a Master Facility List (MFL) to standardize the allocation of unique identifiers for health facilities can overcome identification issues and support health facility management. The Nigerian Federal Ministry of Health (FMOH) recently developed a MFL, and we present the process and outcome. The MFL was developed from the ground up, and includes a state code, a local government area (LGA) code, health facility ownership (public or private), the level of care, and an exclusive LGA level health facility serial number, as part of the unique identifier system in Nigeria. To develop the MFL, the LGAs sent the list of all health facilities in their jurisdiction to the state, which in turn collated for all LGAs under them before sending to the FMOH. At the FMOH, a group of RHIS experts verified the list and identifiers for each state. The national MFL consists of 34,423 health facilities uniquely identified. The list has been published and is available for worldwide access; it is currently used for planning and management of health services in Nigeria. Unique identifiers are a basic component of any information system. However, poor planning and execution of implementing this key standard can diminish the success of the RHIS. Development and adherence to standards is the hallmark for a national health information infrastructure. Explicit processes and multi-level stakeholder engagement is necessary to ensuring the success of the effort.