On the issue of trend and noise in the estimation of extreme rainfall properties.

Up until today extreme rainfall properties are frequently applied in sewer design guidelines. Uncertainty in the estimation of such properties will hence directly influence the dimensions of sewers, structures and pumps. In this paper the issue of potential trend and noise in the estimation is investigated for 6 rain series ranging from 19 to 55 years in duration. Different to recent research that predicts a climate induced-increase in heavy precipitation no clear indication for such trend was found in the investigated historical rain series. Another important aspect is the length of the rain series that is required for the estimation of extreme rainfall properties and the associated uncertainty. The analysis indicates that at least a period of 10 years should be used for the estimation. But even so the possible deviation expressed in terms of the 90 percentile is in the order of 5 to 10% of the 'true value', defined as the value derived when the whole given series is used for the estimation.     

On the effect of spatial variances in historical rainfall time series to CSO performance evaluation.

Historical, high-resolution rain series are the backbone of modern combined sewer overflow (CSO) structure design. These rain series are the input to the computational estimation of the performance of the measures with respect to CSO pollution abatement. However, those historical precipitation measurements are available at only a few locations. Frequently rain series have to be used from gauging stations at a significant distance. In order to judge and to compensate for this influence an estimate between rain characteristics and combined sewer outflow (CSO) performance indicators would be useful. In this paper such correlations have been sought for a collection of 37 rain series covering large areas of Europe. It was found that the mean annual rain volume can explain most of the variances for the performance indicators Number of overflows and CSO volume. For explaining the spatial differences in the efficiency of the CSO structure another rain characteristic, i.e. the maximum event with a return period of one year, is to be used.     

Energy Metabolites as Biomarkers in Ischemic and Dilated Cardiomyopathy

With more than 25 million people affected, heart failure (HF) is a global threat. As energy production pathways are known to play a pivotal role in HF, we sought here to identify key metabolic changes in ischemic- and non-ischemic HF by using a multi-OMICS approach. Serum metabolites and mRNAseq and epigenetic DNA methylation profiles were analyzed from blood and left ventricular heart biopsy specimens of the same individuals. In total we collected serum from n = 82 patients with Dilated Cardiomyopathy (DCM) and n = 51 controls in the screening stage. We identified several metabolites involved in glycolysis and citric acid cycle to be elevated up to 5.7-fold in DCM (p = 1.7 × 10⁻⁶). Interestingly, cardiac mRNA and epigenetic changes of genes encoding rate-limiting enzymes of these pathways could also be found and validated in our second stage of metabolite assessment in n = 52 DCM, n = 39 ischemic HF and n = 57 controls. In conclusion, we identified a new set of metabolomic biomarkers for HF. We were able to identify underlying biological cascades that potentially represent suitable intervention targets.     

Structure-Activity Relationships of Benzamides and Isoindolines Designed as SARS-CoV Protease Inhibitors Effective against SARS-CoV-2

Inhibition of coronavirus (CoV)-encoded papain-like cysteine proteases (PL^pro) represents an attractive strategy to treat infections by these important human pathogens. Herein we report on structure-activity relationships (SAR) of the noncovalent active-site directed inhibitor (R)-5-amino-2-methyl-N-(1-(naphthalen-1-yl)ethyl) benzamide ( 2 b ), which is known to bind into the S3 and S4 pockets of the SARS-CoV PL^pro. Moreover, we report the discovery of isoindolines as a new class of potent PL^pro inhibitors. The studies also provide a deeper understanding of the binding modes of this inhibitor class. Importantly, the inhibitors were also confirmed to inhibit SARS-CoV-2 replication in cell culture suggesting that, due to the high structural similarities of the target proteases, inhibitors identified against SARS-CoV PL^pro are valuable starting points for the development of new pan-coronaviral inhibitors.     

Empirische Methodologien und Methoden der angewandten und der empirischen Ethik

Definition of the problem This paper deals with the question of adequate methodologies and methods to conduct empirical research and integrate empirical knowledge in the field of biomedical ethics. Arguments It starts with reflections about the main subject matter of ethics, the human being as a bio-psycho-social creature and its morals, and argues that social sciences are the adequate basic empirical science in the field of ethics in general. The next paragraph considers theory of science perspectives of the relationship of ethics, empirical findings, methodologies and theories and examples of the integration of empirical findings into ethical deliberations. Reasons for the tension between social science and ethics are scrutinized which are different in the yet to be defined field of empirical ethics compared to traditional applied ethics. Conclusion How a bio-psycho-social ethics that incorporates these criteria into its own body of work could look like is finally depicted.     

Business Intelligence Acceptance: The Prominence of Organizational Factors

The specifics of business intelligence systems compared to operational IS motivate the necessity to research the business intelligence systems acceptance determinants separately. The authors followed an exploratory approach in order to conceptualize a business intelligence acceptance model. Their findings show that in the Business Intelligence Systems context, there is a significant emphasis on organizational factors, such as result demonstrability, social influence, and facilitating conditions with sufficient resources that help build an adequate information culture all substantially influencing the effective acceptance of business intelligence systems.     

Dynamic admission control for two customer classes with stochastic demands and strict due dates

We study a dynamic capacity allocation problem with admission control decisions of a company that caters for two demand classes with random arrivals, capacity requirements and strict due dates. We formulate the problem as a Markov decision process (MDP) in order to find the optimal admission control policy that maximises the expected profit of the company. Such a formulation suffers a state-space explosion. Moreover, it involves an additional dimension arising from the multiple possible order sizes that customers can request which further increases the complexity of the problem. To reduce the cardinality of possible policies, and, thus, the computational requirements, we propose a threshold-based policy. We formulate an MDP to generate such a policy. To deal with the curse of dimensionality, we develop threshold-based approximate algorithms based on the state-reduction heuristics with aggregation proposed previously. Our results reveal that for the majority of instances considered the optimal policy has a threshold structure. We then demonstrate the superiority of the proposed threshold-based approximate algorithms over two benchmark policies in terms of the generated profits and the robustness of the solutions to changes in operational conditions. Finally, we show that our proposed policies are also robust to changes in actual demand from its estimation.     

SIMS and RBS analysis of leached glass: Reliability of RSF method for SIMS quantification

The reliability of the relative sensitivity factor (RSF) approach for secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) quantification of the leached layers on glass was investigated by measuring comparable samples of glass with SIMS and RBS (Rutherford backscattering spectrometry). The RSF factors were calculated using the nominal bulk compositions. Accurate results can be obtained only when the leached layer and the bulk glass have the same major elemental compositions (Si and O) and the matrix effect is inhibited. The concentrations of the different elements in the leached layer obtained from the comparable samples measured by SIMS and RBS are coincident within a factor of 2This paper is a part of a thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the PhD degree at the University of Technology of Vienna, 1991. The paper was orally presented in a symposium, Analysis of Working Materials, held in Vienna, 22–29 May 1991.     

Knowledge and information awareness for initiating transactive memory system processes of computer-supported collaborating ad hoc groups

This paper presents an innovative approach for initiating processes of a transactive memory system in newly formed groups of experts collaborating computer-supported in a complex problem-solving task. Our empirical study compared 15 experimental and 15 control groups, each consisting of triads. In the experimental condition, the triads were provided with a tool for fostering knowledge and information awareness, that is, being informed about the knowledge and the underlying information of the collaboration partners in form of digital concept maps. In the control condition, the groups had no access to this tool. Results confirmed the potential of the tool to initiate processes of a transactive memory system: shared agreement of the knowledge of the other group members’ knowledge proved to influence group performance positively. In addition, previous findings of the tool’s potential to establish knowledge and information awareness and to augment group performance could be replicated. However, the postulated mediating effect of processes of a transactive memory system concerning the impact of knowledge and information awareness on group performance did not reach statistical significance. Aspects for future studies and implications of these findings regarding their practical implementation, for example, in teams of organizations, are discussed.