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By the year 2539 almost 75% of all freshwater mollusc species within Europe will be lost. The transformation of natural ecosystems, the extension of infrastructure, as well as agriculture are the main threats. The Roman snail (Helix pomatia L. 1758) has been part of human culture for centuries and is protected by law as an endangered species in several regions, and at the same time regarded and treated as a pest, making the conservation of this species difficult.
The aim of this thesis was to create a better understanding of H. pomatia and its functional role within the ecosystem. Eight subpopulations were studied regarding its role within the food web, the use of empty shells as a mircohabitat and its influence on vegetation by showing food preferences. The latter, due to the fact, that a strong predation pressure can minimize habitats, which leads to higher pressure on the local vegetation and a limited possibility of shells being used as a microhabitat.
First, the relationships between H. pomatia individuals, subpopulations and their predators were analysed. The total number and percentage of shells that showed external attack marks by predators (32%) and internal utilization marks by Diptera pupae (45%) were analysed and correlated to morphometric traits of shells. Signs of external attack and internal utilization marks were positively correlated (R = 0.79; P = 0.020). External attacks were more regular in larger shells and internal utilization was more frequent in shells with higher body density.
The second chapter focuses on the shells of H. pomatia and their value as microhabitat for shell adopters in different vegetation forms and during two sample periods. Out of 618 collected shells, 91.4 % were inhabited and the average was 1.5 time higher in summer, than in autumn. The number of shell adopters per shell was 1.5 times higher in herbaceous vegetation, than in areas dominated by trees. Shell width (P = 0.008), but not shell height (P = 0.078) had a significant higher influence.
Finally, food preferences of H. pomatia were analysed, showing a pronounced preference for Urtica dioica (35% of all 697 feeding interactions) and plant litter (44%). Only 27 out of 143 available plant species were eaten and a literature review confirmed U. dioica as a food plant for 19 other terrestrial snail species. The width and height of the snail shells were related to the feeding height as smaller, juvenile snails fed higher in vegetation (384mm ± 327mm) compared to adult individuals (68mm ± 194mm) (P<0.001).
These results highlight the importance of H. pomatia in the studied ecosystem. H. pomatia is an important food source for predators and host for parasitoids, the shells offer habitat and refuge for soil organisms and as a relatively specialized herbivore and decomposer H. pomatia contributes to herbivory and nutrient cycling in ecosystems.
Hopefully this study may help to motivate future conservation efforts.
Due to environmental impacts from anthropomorphic climate change, countries from around the world are committed to an energy transition from fossil fuels to renewable and sustainable energy sources. The heating and cooling sector represents the largest share of total energy consumption globally, not only for domestic use but also for commercial and industrial purposes of which only 11% is covered by renewable energy. One renewable source, geothermal energy, has the potential to cover much of this demand, particularly heating demand, for the agriculture and food sector. Geothermal use in the agri-food industry continues to be positive overall, yet slow adoption and inconsistent growth have not met its potential as claimed by experts. This trend may be explained by a lack of coherent policy and initiatives from regulating government bodies. This research explores the relationship and the degree of correlation between government support, expressed in terms of policy incentives, and the growth of geothermal energy use in the agri-food sector. Two hypotheses are constructed to test this relationship. The first assumes that government support through policy leads to positive growth in geothermal argi-food, and the second assumes that no relationship exists. The research is a multiple case study of twelve countries from 2010 to 2020. Methods used in this study include Likert summative scale, a statistical and content analysis of secondary sources such as policy documents, laws, and other government acts. The results show a strong correlation between policy incentives and adoption of geothermal energy in agri-food sector. However, only 23% of growth in capacity in case countries can be explained by the levels of government support. Additionally, not all policies hold equal weight in that they are implemented on different levels of governance (global, national, and local). The study observes that between these three levels, national policies have the most correlative effect on geothermal energy adoption, while global and local policies do not seem to have significant influence. These effects vary but the overall market trends are influenced heavily by leading performers. Countries that show the most growth are – Hungary, Iceland, the Netherlands, and Türkiye. They all share strong government support on a national level, targeted policies for geothermal agri-food, and geothermal energy is economically competitive when compared to other forms of energy.
This study explores the interplay between the UNESCO status and climate governance in World Heritage cities. With climate change posing significant threats to living urban landscapes, local governments and public actors strive to implement sustainable and resilient strategies. However, complications arise when cities attain the World Heritage status, complicating climate governance practices. Qualitative research, involving interviews with key stakeholders from the Climate and Monument Protection Departments in Lübeck, Regensburg, and Bamberg, reveals a negative impact of cultural heritage on climate governance. The study contends that, when harnessed effectively, cultural heritage can contribute to the sustainability and resilience of cities in addressing climate change. It emphasises the necessity for flexibility, collaboration, and a human-centric approach, advocating for a common understanding and prioritisation of human life within climate governance. In conclusion, this research underscores the importance of viewing heritage as a dynamic component integrated into cities' climate governance strategies.
This study describes the seasonal course of denitrifying and nitrate-reducing bacteria in a dimictic mesotrophic lake (Lake Scharmützelsee, Brandenburg, Germany) within a three-year period from 2011 to 2013. The bacterial cell numbers were quantified by the fluorescence microscopy, most probable number (MPN) and PCR-dependent quantification of the chromosomal 16S rDNA and of the nirS and nirK gene copy number. The highest seasonal differences (up to three orders of magnitudes) have been measured usingMPNin the epilimnion. This variation was not reflected by PCR-dependent approaches or direct microscopical enumeration. At adverse conditions (low temperature and/or low nitrate concentrations), the differences between MPN and gene copy numbers increased by up to five orders of magnitudes and decreased to one magnitude at favourable environmental conditions. These results can be explained best by an increasing ratio of viable but not cultivable (VBNC) cells or dead cells at impairing conditions. In the hypolimnion, the courses of MPN and nir gene copy numbers were similar. This can be explained by a higher feeding pressure and therefore smaller amounts of dormant cells. In the pelagial in general, the total cell numbers enumerated by either microscopical or molecular approaches were similar. In the sediment, more than 99% of the DNA was obviously not related to viable bacteria but was rather DNA in dead cells or adsorbed to particle surfaces.
Salvaging Buildings : reclaiming a livelihood from the excesses of Istanbul's mass urbanization
(2023)
Turkey’s demolition waste management is, to a great extent, dependent on çıkmacıs (reclaimers) who salvage condemned buildings for raw materials and architectural elements. Its urbanization history is full of key moments marked by building demolitions, which became a necessary material resource for informal urbanization. As early as the 1970s, the çıkmacıs helped the gecekondus [squatter houses] by supplying second-hand building materials and construction loans. They managed to turn a lack of infrastructure into an advantage and remain very adaptable to the ever-changing conditions of neo-liberalized urbanization. They depend on solidarity networks and other informal resources. Assemblage thinking helps to redefine the concept of informality, understand the relational dynamics between various actors, and focus on the agency of materials. The empirical data gained from ‘follow the thing’ ethnographic research in Turkey and Georgia reveals the double lives of çıkmacıs who move between village and city. Additionally, by following the example of a reclaimed window frame’s journey from Istanbul to Tbilisi, we can more clearly see the second-hand trade network in the context of urbanization and incremental architecture. In the context of waste’s materiality, the empirical part of the research shows the symbiotic relationship between çıkmacıs and the discarded demolition materials.
High-resolution imaging of buried metal interconnect structures in advanced microelectronic products with full-field X-ray microscopy is demonstrated in the hard X-ray regime, i.e., at photon energies > 10 keV. The combination of two multilayer optics—a side-by-side Montel (or nested Kirkpatrick–Baez) condenser optic and a high aspect-ratio multilayer Laue lens—results in an asymmetric optical path in the transmission X-ray microscope. This optics arrangement allows the imaging of 3D nanostructures in opaque objects at a photon energy of 24.2 keV (In-Kα X-ray line). Using a Siemens star test pattern with a minimal feature size of 150 nm, it was proven that features < 150 nm can be resolved. In-Kα radiation is generated from a Ga-In alloy target using a laboratory X-ray source that employs the liquid-metal-jet technology. Since the penetration depth of X-rays into the samples is significantly larger compared to 8 keV photons used in state-of-the-art laboratory X-ray microscopes (Cu-Kα radiation), 3D-nanopattered materials and structures can be imaged nondestructively in mm to cm thick samples. This means that destructive de-processing, thinning or cross-sectioning of the samples are not needed for the visualization of interconnect structures in microelectronic products manufactured using advanced packaging technologies. The application of laboratory transmission X-ray microscopy in the hard X-ray regime is demonstrated for Cu/Cu6Sn5/Cu microbump interconnects fabricated using solid–liquid interdiffusion (SLID) bonding.
Comparing hybrid urbanisms in the global south : water delivery configurations in Peru and Ghana
(2023)
Urban development processes in the Global South (and North) are often described as characterized by formal and informal practices of different actors and their respective material realities. In critical urban studies, the disposition for this binary conception of formal and informal urbanisms has been discussed for many years. To a certain extent, these sometimes align rather problematically with contrasting notions of the “structural” versus the “everyday.” In this article, we explore an understanding of formal and informal urban practices (and respectively “structure” and “everyday”) as always interrelated, and we develop a methodology for a comparative examination of such hybrid urbanisms. In doing so, we address a missing link in the surging theoretical debate on comparative/southern urbanisms, which has rarely been substantiated by methodological explorations. The adapted concept of “delivery configurations” combines analyses of actor networks, material realities, rules and regulations, discourses, and heterogenous arrays of urban practices of negotiating these. However, bringing together local particularities and structural commonalities and exploring their interrelation only provides a basis for understanding case‐specific complexities. We argue that embedding the analysis in a multi‐scalar comparative framework can further its analytical rather than descriptive attributes and provide deeper insights into issues such as social inequality. To illustrate our methodological contribution, we provide first insights from a comparative research
project of water delivery in different neighbourhoods in the secondary cities of Sunyani (Ghana) and Arequipa (Peru). We highlight the practical challenges of comparing diverse urban contexts and examining the rather complex relationships between infrastructure delivery, urban development, and social inequality.
Biomass and bioenergy perspectives of a coal region : status quo, potential and scenarios in Lusatia
(2023)
Coal has been one of the main fuels used in Europe. Its decreasing role due to the ongoing transformation of the energy system will create significant socio-economic challenges. The switch into renewable energy systems could be an alternative to maintain jobs and economic activities within the affected regions. Biomass use and bioenergy can play an important role in the energy transition. Instead of energy crops, forest and agricultural residues should be used as biogenic energy sources in the future to avoid impacts on land use and food security. The main objective of this article is to investigate the biomass potential of a coal region and to provide scenarios for the future development of bioenergy production. Due to the changing framework conditions and, as a result, the different biomass focuses, previous bioenergy potential estimates must be reviewed. The methods for determining the potential of biomass for energy production was used for Lusatia (in German: Lausitz), the second largest coal region in Germany. These methods can also be applied in other regions. As a first step, the regional status quo assessment of cultivated areas and yields had decisive relevance for calculating biomass potential ranges. In a second step, the current bioenergy facilities in the region were identified, with a focus on power and heat production. The third step was the estimation of future regional bioenergy use. Therefore, the regional potential was gathered with the generally supra-regional framework conditions. For this purpose, national scenario studies were used, which contain the relevant target values and framework conditions. Two scenarios were developed for future bioenergy estimations: a conservative path based on the current policies and a progressive path, derived from the goal of climate neutrality by 2045. The results show a qualitative comparison among both scenarios and the previously determined potential ranges. Bioenergy can probably contribute to achieving climate neutrality with an increase in wood-fired systems, while agricultural bioenergy potential is likely to decline. In the discussion section, however, the uncertainty of these results is pointed out, as future use of bioenergy will be heavily influenced by the regulatory framework, competition with material use and the influences of climate change.
The Iberian Peninsula comprises one of the largest boundaries between Mediterranean and Eurosiberian vegetation, known as sub-Mediterranean zone. This ecotone hosts many unique plant species and communities and constitutes the low-latitude (warm) margin of numerous central European species which co-occur with Mediterranean vegetation. Two of the main species found in this region are the Eurosiberian European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) and the Mediterranean Pyrenean oak (Quercus pyrenaica Willd.). It remains unclear how the different physiological and adaptive strategies of these two species reflect their niche partitioning within a sub-Mediterranean community and to what extent phenotypic variation (intraspecific variability) is driving niche partitioning across Eurosiberian and Mediterranean species. We quantified functional niche partitioning, based on the n-dimensional hypervolume to nine traits related to resource acquisition strategies (leaf, stem and root) plus relative growth rate as an additional whole-plant trait, and the environmental niche similarity between Pyrenean oak and European beech. Further, we analyzed the degree of phenotypic variation of both target species and its relationship with relative growth rates (RGR) and environmental conditions. Plant recruitment was measured for both target species as a proxy for the average fitness. Species’ functional space was highly segregated (13.09% overlap), mainly due to differences in niche breadth (59.7%) rather than niche replacement (25.6%), and beech showed higher trait variability, i.e., had larger functional space. However, both species shared the environmental space, i.e., environmental niches were overlapped. Most plant traits were not related to abiotic variables or RGR, neither did RGR to plant traits. Both target species share similar environmental space, however, show notably different functional resource-use strategies, promoting a high complementarity that contributes to maintaining a high functionality in sub-Mediterranean ecosystems. Therefore, we propose that conservation efforts be oriented to preserve both species in these habitats to maximize ecosystem functionality and resilience.
Linking functional composition moments of the sub-mediterranean ecotone with environmental drivers
(2023)
Functional trait-based approaches are extensively applied to the study of mechanisms governing community assembly along environmental gradients. These approaches have been classically based on studying differences in mean values among species, but there is increasing recognition that alternative metrics of trait distributions should be considered to decipher the mechanisms determining community assembly and species coexistence. Under this framework, the main aim of this study is to unravel the effects of environmental conditions as drivers of plant community assembly in sub-Mediterranean ecotones.
We set 60 plots in six plant communities of a sub-Mediterranean forest in Central Spain, and measured key above- and belowground functional traits in 411 individuals belonging to 19 species, along with abiotic variables. We calculated community-weighted mean (CWM), skewness (CWS) and kurtosis (CWK) of three plant dimensions, and used maximum likelihood techniques to analyze how variation in these functional community traits was driven by abiotic factors. Additionally, we estimated the relative contribution of intraspecific trait variability and species turnover to variation in CWM. The first three axes of variation of the principal component analyses were related to three main plant ecological dimensions: Leaf Economics Spectrum, Root Economics Spectrum and plant hydraulic architecture, respectively. Type of community was the most important factor determining differences in the functional structure among communities, as compared to the role of abiotic variables. We found strong differences among communities in their CWMs in line with their biogeographic origin (Eurosiberian vs Mediterranean), while differences in CWS and CWK indicate different trends in the functional structure among communities and the coexistence of different functional strategies, respectively. Moreover, changes in functional composition were primarily due to intraspecific variability. We observed a high number of strategies in the forest with the different communities spreading along the acquisitive-conservative axis of resource-use, partly matching their Eurosiberian-Mediterranean nature, respectively. Intraspecific trait variability, rather than species turnover, stood as the most relevant factor when analyzing functional changes and assembly patterns among communities. Altogether, our data support the notion that ecotones are ecosystems where relatively minor environmental shifts may result in changes in plant and functional composition.
The material authenticity of cultural heritage has been questioned by societies in which the modern paradigm of conservation has not developed from within the native culture. This paper examines the philosophical and practical traditions in Iran regarding the materiality and authenticity of past structures. By reviewing the emergence of the Western conservation paradigm in Iran, this paper highlights two key factors: the rapidness of this paradigm shift and the remarkable contradiction between the new and old paradigms. By borrowing the Deleuzo-Guattarian concept of a ‘body without organs’ (BwO), this paper problematises the rapidness and radicality of the paradigm shift in Iran. It suggests exploring the under-investigated possibilities between the pre-modern and modern paradigms to address the gap between native circumstances and Western standards.
Urban heritage planning in Tehran and beyond : sequences of disrupted spatial-discursive assemblages
(2023)
Despite the impact of ideological rigidity, the primary challenge of heritage planning in Tehran and beyond lies not in the dominance of an inflexible Authorized Heritage Discourse, but rather in the absence of stable spatial-discursive and administrative structures. Solmaz Yadollahi maps the historical trajectory of conservation and urban heritage planning in Iran, depicting a discursive-spatial assemblage that tends to knock down its accumulated resources. This is in line with Katouzian's portrayal of Iran as a pick-axe society. Residing within this society, the studied assemblage strives to deconstruct the prevailing structures and usher in a fresh one, paradoxically perpetuating the very cycle it seeks to escape.
Morphological and optical properties of a multilayer film (CAZO/CZAO/ZACO) prepared by spin-coating method and deposited on a glass substrate were evaluated. The study was initially carried out for each layer, individually and then as a multilayer subsequently. Structural properties using X-ray diffraction (XRD), energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), infrared spectra (IR) and X-ray photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) showed the presence of three phases of zinc, copper and silver oxides at different levels. The CZAO sample observed with scanning electron microscope (SEM) showed an excellent porous surface with a large deformation in the multilayer configuration. Doping with zinc and copper in the silver crystal lattice improved the crystal structure and reduced the optical energy gap, thus increasing the optical absorbance and refractive index. The dielectric constants and showed an increase in the optical polarization values for lower photonic energies. The maximum degradation rate for photocatalysts of methylene blue was 89 % for a 5-h exposure period with CAZO/CZAO/ZACO while it reached 71 % for the CZAO sample during the same time period. The sensitivity of samples to light proved that the presence of ultraviolet radiation increases the number of holes trapped by oxygen ions and causes more free electrons and contribute to a better production of photocurrent than in darkness.
A contribution to the online monitoring of partial discharges in high-voltage grid components
(2024)
Increasing utilization of HV power cable lines, and particularly the advent of long HVDC underground links, results in the need to sensitively monitor their condition, such as by tracking the emergence and development of partial discharges. This study demonstrates that existing solutions are poorly suited to the case of HVDC lines, and that a new, more sophisticated monitoring system needs to address a wide array of diverse problems. First of all, the overview of the task and main functional blocks of the monitoring system is given. Following this, selected blocks are subject to detailed examination in subsequent chapters.
The first of these blocks, a high-frequency current transformer (HFCT), is responsible for capturing the signal in the power line and transferring it to the electronics. This component receives in-depth coverage: general design considerations, computation of leakage inductance, operation in presence of a power current, resonant behavior, balanced design. Particular attention is given to the application of Finite Element Analysis (FEA) in relation to the HFCT, however, the demonstrated techniques can also be applied to other magnetic devices. Last section of the chapter presents various stages of development, experimental setups, prototypes, and the final device which has been put into series production.
The next block addresses extraction of signals from noise. A literature analysis is conducted concerning noise suppression in partial discharge recordings, and the application of the signal separation approach based on Linear Predictive Coding is shown.
In the section on localization, examples illustrating problems encountered during the development of a partial discharge localization algorithm are presented.
In the chapter devoted to laboratory tests, various auxiliary experiments conducted during the system's development are compiled, where some of them are: Time Domain Reflectometry (TDR) TDR-based line characterization, estimation of monitoring sensitivity, measurement of the cable attenuation and reflection coefficients of the accessories.
In the final chapter – field tests – the installation of the system on a 110 kV line and the measured transfer function are demonstrated.
Plenty of semiconductor devices are developed to operate with private data. To guarantee data privacy cryptographic algorithms are used, where the secrecy is based on the used keys. Theoretically, the cryptographic algorithms using keys with recommended lengths are secure. The issue is that a potential attacker can steal the devices and attack in a lab. Physical attacks are usually aimed to perturb normal operation of a device and to extract cryptographic keys, e.g. by means of fault injection (FI). One class of FI attacks exploits the sensitivity of semiconductor devices to light and are performed using a laser as the light source.
This work investigates the sensitivity of different logic and memory cells to optical Fault Injection attacks. Front-side attacks against cells manufactured in different IHP technologies were performed using two different red lasers controlled by Riscure software. To reach the repeatability of the experimental results and to increase the comparability of the results with attack results published in literature the setup parameters as well as setting parameters of the Riscure software were experimentally evaluated. Attacks were performed against inverter, NAND, NOR, flip-flop cells from standard libraries, radiation-hard flip-flops based on Junction Isolated Common Gate technique, radiation-tolerant Triple Modular Redundancy registers as well as non-volatile Resistive Random Access Memory (RRAM) cells. The results of attacks against volatile circuits were successful transient bit-set and bit-reset as well permanent stuck-at faults. The results of attacks against RRAM cells were successful in the sense that manipulation of all RRAM logic states was feasible. The faults injected during the performed experiments were repeatable and reproducible.
The goal of this work was not only to achieve successful FI but also to determine cell area(s) sensitive to laser illumination. Knowledge about areas sensitive to laser illumination can be used by designers to implement corresponding countermeasure(s) at the initial stage of chip development and is the necessary step to design appropriate countermeasures. For example, metal fillers can be applied as optical obstacles reducing the success of front-side FI attacks, i.e. as a possible low-cost countermeasure. Based on the knowledge of the sensitive cell areas, the placement of the metal fillers can be automated in the future, i.e. the findings given in the work can serve as a basis for a methodology development for improving resistance against optical FI attacks at the initial stage of chip development. Such methodology can be adapted for each chip manufacturing technology.
The 'cultural appropriation' of traditional textiles from Mexico : an analysis of 3 case studies
(2023)
This doctoral thesis intended to examine the phenomenon of ‘cultural appropriation’ of traditional textiles from Mexico through an analysis of 3 case studies. This research had the objective of understanding the phenomenon through the relationships, perspectives, and discourses of the social actors involved, by following the development of controversies involving different objects of material culture from different communities: the xaam nïxuy Ayuujk (Mixe) blouse from Santa Maria Tlahuitoltepec, Oaxaca; the Hñuhú and Hñahñ (Otomi) “Tenango” embroideries from the communities of Tenago de Doria and San Nicolas in Hidalgo; and the mestizo gabanes from Santa Clara del Cobre and Nahuatzen in the State of Michoacán.
This doctoral examination was sustained through theoretical approximations that located the occurrences within transnational/ transcultural processes, engaging with qualitative methodologies and multi-sited ethnographies in order to obtain data that elucidated on the diversity of objects, actors, relationships, understandings, perceptions, values, and discourses involved in the ‘cultural appropriation’ of traditional textiles controversies in the country.
The content analysis of this doctoral research dissected a number of different processes, effects, and consequences of the phenomenon as it developed in dissimilar locations and periods of time. The examination revealed a complex intersection of meanings, productions, circulations, and consumptions of culture, that simultaneously affected cultural meanings, relationships, and processes, raising concerns over the management of traditional textiles as objects of cultural heritage, and the unviability of protecting communal creative domains through national legal mechanisms.
The development of computer technologies allows using numerical simulations in the early stages of aircraft design more and more often. The role of both wind tunnels and initial test flights used to validate of solutions seems to be diminishing. Big systems for three-dimensional simulations of Fluid-Structure Interactions (FSI) constitute highly specialized and costly software. Most of the codes are based on many simplifications. One of them is the assumption of linearity of the structural model being in contradiction with real-life situations. The postdoctoral dissertation presents the results of simulations for complex, multi-scale objects and non-linear structure models and extended structure testing in relation to damage in macroscale analysis. What is crucial for carrying out the assumed analyses is to extend a numerical tool comprising a flow and a structural program and a space grid deformation model for a system allowing to take into consideration the non-linearity of the structure. The point of reference for testing the suggested approaches are the existing solutions of the aeroelastic linear problems. Results of the recent research might be applied for the construction of increasingly common unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). Modern structure is a key element that affects the basic parameters as mass or range of these vehicles. Until now the research and development of the aeroelastic calculation algorithm for commonly used materials in the framework of linear geometry and linear-elastic material behavior was used. The current developments of materials for light-weight design common use of 3D printing technology causes the increasingly widespread use of new alternative materials in the aviation industry. This is particularly true for the design and construction of UAV, where the basic requirements are the lightness of the structure and the maximum range. Unfortunately, the fulfillment of the above criteria means that the materials used are often loaded not only in a elastic range but also more often above this limit. In case of analyzing aeroelastic phenomena for a loaded structure we should take a closer look at the behavior of the material outside the elastic range in which the damage occurs. The process of destroying in the face of such dangerous phenomena as flutter in aircraft constructions requires a deeper analysis of the mechanics of materials, in particular for new materials and their manufacturing techniques. As part of joint experiments and numerical simulations, detailed research was carried out to describe the behavior of printed materials, which will be increasingly used in the design of aircraft structures. Extending the postdoctoral dissertation with the research carried out at BTU will allow further development of the existing FSI algorithm, taking into account the structural behavior more accurately and the possibility of predicting damage processes.
The contribution of community involvement in heritage management : a cultural mapping project
(2023)
Heritage has been lately the matter of debate regarding its definition, conservation and management approaches. In the last few years, there has been an increasing demand for the involvement of the local community in heritage management. Too often, the involvement perspectives of key stakeholders in general and the community members, in particular, are entirely different. While the theoretical ground of community involvement is somehow well set, heritage management has been slow in applying the involvement approach. Practically, it is not easy to find the balance to achieve all the goals of key stakeholders in any involvement project. Subsequently, there are a few numbers of empirical works on the practical implications of understanding heritage management effective tools and limited indication to convince recent ‘power-holders’ such as governmental organizations to distribute their power with local community members.
This doctoral research project explores community involvement in heritage management as an effective solution to building a strong management system. The study aims to examine the level and the quality of involvement in the management of heritage sites in general through a cultural mapping-based approach. This is applied to a case study which is the Religious Complex in Historic Cairo World Heritage Site. The research outcomes indicate the importance of involving the local community in heritage management and planning processes. Ultimately, the study provides critical empirical evidence and draws valuable theoretical and practical assumptions that spread knowledge of cultural mapping in critical issues, such as the drivers of involvement and cooperative decision-making.
Brain-computer interfacing (BCI) is a relatively new field of study that involves engineering, neuroscience, psychology, and physiology. A BCI is a system that allows direct communication between the brain and the environment, using signals from electroencephalography (EEG) to identify a user's intentions and mental states. This can be used for human-machine interaction (HMI) to adapt software or control a device. Particularly passive BCIs are the most promising for the general population, as they can detect and interpret a user's mental state without requiring their attention. This can enable neuroadaptive technology (NAT), which allows a machine to learn over time how the user perceives and interprets the world. However, there are still obstacles to be overcome before BCI technology can be applied in real-world situations for NAT.
In this work I firstly address the issue of subject dependence in training data collection for classifier calibration, which can be time-consuming and impractical. I investigated the training of a subject-independent predictive model that is trained on a group of other users' data and applied to online-testing data of a new person. This was done in the context of training an automatic classifier for error detection and correction. Results showed that a classifier model can be trained without user-specific calibration and with high accuracy. The number of electrodes used in training the model was also reduced. Further it was validated that the trained classifier models were based on cortical sources and not other modalities.
In a second study I address the issue of task-dependence. To that end I tested the application of a potentially task-independent calibration paradigm for mental workload assessment in a new task. This new task was a speed reading context, where subjects read texts of varying difficulty and speed. The study found that the mental workload prediction model was accurate in classifying mental workload in different reading tasks, indicating that it can be used as a task-independent classifier for mental workload.
In a third study I examine if it is possible to measure neural correlates of human moral assessment using a passive BCI on a single-trial basis. A calibration paradigm was developed using pictures that were ranked as morally unacceptable and morally neutral. However, the results showed low classification accuracies and it was not possible to reliably distinguish between a user's subjective moral evaluations on a single-trial basis using current classification approaches.
The results presented in this thesis provide solutions towards real-world applicability of NAT enabled by passive BCIs, as examples of a subject-independent and a task-independent classifier are demonstrated and discussed. Further, approaches for increased versatility of passive BCI technology are presented, that could make passive BCIs more feasible for use in future real-world human-machine interaction settings.
Cities are major contributors to climate change and biodiversity loss, and at the same time particularly affected by some of their consequences. Urban green can help address these challenges and provide numerous other benefits to people. Economic valuation can estimate the value that people assign to these diverse urban ecosystem services. The environmental economics literature uses several valuation methods. This work examines the valuation of urban ecosystem services with choice experiments. It includes five articles that use empirical analysis to address three overarching research goals: First, to improve understanding of the value of urban ecosystem services to urban residents. Second, to contribute to improving the validity of choice experiments. Third, to develop modeling of spatial patterns in the value of urban ecosystem services.
Chapter 1 describes the background and motivation of the valuation of urban ecosystem services with choice experiments, gives an overview over the relevant literature, and sets out the research objectives and methods of this dissertation.
Chapter 2 presents a choice experiment on green spaces, street trees and green roofs in Bremen. It analyzes the effect of additional information that these measures are part of a climate adaptation strategy. The results show greater willingness to pay among informed respondents. Part of the effect can be explained by a higher credibility of the survey.
Chapter 3 describes a choice experiment on urban gardens in Berlin and Stuttgart. It explores how respondents process the information provided in the questionnaire. It finds that questions about the information do not significantly affect either recall or the responses in the choice experiment.
Chapter 4 is based on choice experiments on street trees, green spaces, and greenways in four German cities. It examines how choice experiment surveys should elicit perceived consequentiality. The results show advantages of elicitation before the choice experiment over the usual elicitation afterwards.
Chapter 5 explores how valid policy makers perceive the results of choice experiments on urban green in several German cities, and what consequences this has for their use of the results. Interviews show that most policy makers use the results in their city to raise awareness or justify positions. Perceptions of validity are mixed, but do not play a major role in this type of use.
Chapter 6 examines the spatial distribution of the value of urban ecosystem services using choice experiments on green spaces, urban trees, green roofs, and green facades in Berlin and Leipzig. It develops and tests new choice models that may better represent than the common approach how the value of urban green space decreases with distance.
Based on the findings of the articles, Chapter 7 derives recommendations for practitioners of choice experiments and for urban green policy makers. Finally, it identifies research gaps that would be promising for future studies.
There are many names we use to call them, like the (original) Wireless Sensor Networks, Wireless Sensor and Actuator Networks, Internet of Things, Cyber-Physical Systems, Cyber-Physical Systems of Systems, and some others. More or less visible, wireless sensor networks are already applied in many aspects of our lives and for different purposes. During the 20 years of Fachgespräch Sensornetze (FGSN) we were able to observe the process of the birth and evolution of wireless sensor networks. What do they look like now, from that time perspective? Is there still room for research andimprovements? Or are they maybe already that mature that everything has already been said? And what do they look like from the industry point of view? What is the future of sensor networks? Where are they heading? These retrospective and perspective views are the central topic of the 20th edition of the Fachgespräch Sensornetze (FGSN 2023) held on the 4th of September 2023 at Hasso-Plattner-Institut as part of the NetSys 2023 conference in Potsdam. We were happy to meet again, to discuss these subjects within the scientific community. The aim of this series of Fachgespräch is to give scientists from academia and industry the opportunity for an informal exchange of ideas and to strengthen cooperation in this multidisciplinary research area.
This thesis is dedicated to the structured sheet metals topic. Structured sheet metals are semi-finished products with the honeycomb (cell) shape, made by cold forming of the flat sheets. They represent an innovative technology in the field of lightweight construction. In recent years, this technology has undergone dynamic development what gives to researchers possibilities to improve the level of knowledge about structured sheets metals properties and explore new application fields for them.
The structuring improves basic properties, such as stiffness, compared to the flat sheet material. Due to these advantages, the use of structured sheet metals offers enormous innovation potential for efficient lightweight construction in many industrial sectors such as aerospace, rail transport technology, architectural products. Structured sheets have already been implementing in lighting technology, in the manufacture of household appliances and even in automotive industry. So that, the question arises if it possible to apply this kind of material successfully in other areas such as building industry.
This work contains an overview of the lightweight constructions historical development and stiffening elements in the steel industry, also the creation process of structured sheet metals, manufacturing investigated specimens, further bending tests, numerical simulations, analysis and comparison of resulting data and possible further use of lightweight beams with structured sheet elements as a building construction.
In this work beams compound of structured and flat plates are investigated. Steps of structured plates manufacturing process are described: hydroforming, point- and laser welding and bending. As a result, lightweight beams of two main shapes are manufactured: C- and square sectioned. There are four types of beams for each of the shapes are investigated. Every type has same geometrical dimensions, but thicknesses vary.
The series of laboratory tests with created beams under load is made. Three- and four-points bending tests are chosen for that.
This work also presents numerical analysis based on conducted experiments: buckling and global non-linear behavior of specimens by use of the software package ABAQUS/CAE are obtained. The behavior of the beams with structured and flat sheets under load is analyzed and the comparison of parameters such as load bearing capacity and stiffnesses is made.
Finally, in addition to laboratory and simulations, parametric modelling is done. Also, based on parametric calculations, the proposal for calculation the beams stiffness for with higher thicknesses is given. It allows to predict the behavior of beams with structured sheets with different thicknesses without manufacturing and conducting the expensive and time-taking laboratory experiments.
In conclusion, the recommendations for the simplifying of manufacturing process and for the improving of the beams stiffnesses are given.
With the increasing consciousness of the value of wetland ecological and environmental functions and its fast rate of decline in the size of this important and rich ecosystem globally, the Niger Delta ecosystem has been reported to be undergoing tremendous change, hence the need for this research, to identify the challenges and proffer solutions. This study focuses on ascertaining if a change has occurred in the Upper Orashi Forest Reserved wetland, to know and evaluate the policies used in managing the wetland in the region and Nigeria. To ascertain the wetland change, land cover change detection was carried out using Geographic Information Systems and Remote Sensing to produce paradigm or data to detect change occurrence in the wetland area. Supervised classification of land use and land cover change was carried out using LANDSAT data from 2002, 2008, and 2019. Thereafter, the land cover transition was mapped for the period 2002 to 2019 and this was computed for the net land cover change for the period of study. The site was classified into three different classes and each class was analyzed using the land use and land cover change model formula. The result from this part shows that there is a consistent decrease in the wetland area for the period under review and in the other two identified classes, some interchangeable compositions were observed for the period of study. To validate this result, the opinion of experts and the host community is needed. Two sets of questionnaires were designed for experts and local community dwellers to sample their opinion in relation to the wetland and its management. The information collected was analyzed using Microsoft excel and the result shows that changes have occurred in the wetland of Upper Orashi Forest (decrease in size and other challenging issues with respect to policies and regulations). This study has identified critical challenging issues facing wetlands in the region or driving factors of wetland loss in the study area. Thereafter making recommendations that will help address these issues to actualize environmental sustainability and sustainable wetland in the region and Nigeria at large.
This thesis summarizes the author’s developments of combustion models and multi-objective optimization methods for gasoline and diesel engines. The combustion models belong to the family of zero-dimensional stochastic reactor models introduced in the 1990s to improve the prediction of emissions with detailed chemistry in partially stirred reactors.
The first part introduces the fundamentals of the physical and chemical models describing the combustion process. As a novelty, k−ε turbulence models were implemented in the stochastic reactor model to predict the turbulent time and length scales in gasoline and diesel engines. This development allowed an improvement of the models for convective heat transfer, fuel evaporation, gas exchange across the valves, turbulent flame propagation and crevice flow, which depend on the turbulent time and length scales.
In the second part, the multi-objective optimization platform for automatic training of the stochastic reactor model is presented. The optimization method considers multiple operating points to find a set of model parameters that predict performance and emissions over the entire engine map. The Non-domination Sorting Genetic Algorithm II is combined with the stochastic reactor model and response surface models to find the best Pareto front. Multi-criteria decision making is used to select the best designs from the Pareto front.
Finally, the third part of this thesis deals with the validation of the stochastic reactor model and the multi-objective optimization platform. For this purpose, experiments of two single-cylinder research engines with spark ignition, one passenger car engine with compression ignition and one heavy duty engine with compression ignition are used. For the spark ignition engines, a set of model parameters was found that predicts well the power and emissions over the whole engine map. The calculated turbulent kinetic energy, dissipation, and angular momentum follow the trends of the three-dimensional computational fluid dynamic simulations to a good approximation for various operating points. For the two compression ignition engines, the prediction of combustion progress and nitrogen oxide emissions are in good agreement with the experiments. Larger discrepancies were found for the prediction of carbon monoxide and unburned hydrocarbon. Optimization of the soot model parameters improves the prediction of soot mass for operating points throughout the engine map.
Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) are pivotal in Critical Infrastructures (CIs) and Industrial Control Systems (ICSs), governing processes in nuclear power plants, petrochemical factories, and water treatment systems. Despite their importance, PLCs are vulnerable to security threats, notably control logic injection attacks, aiming to sabotage physical processes. This thesis delves into PLC security, analyzing vulnerabilities in non-cryptographically and cryptographically protected PLCs, particularly Siemens S7-300 and S7-1500 models.
Siemens, an automation market leader, utilizes S7-300 PLCs in millions of applications, reflecting the broader ICS security landscape. The S7-1500 line claims resistance to cyberattacks, including control logic injections. The thesis evaluates authentication in non-cryptographically protected PLCs, introducing a stealthy control logic injection attack scenario using an S7-300 PLC and S7Comm protocol.
The second part explores integrity checks in cryptographically protected S7-1500 PLCs. Findings, encompassing disclosed vulnerabilities, lead to a severe control logic injection attack with a malicious interrupt block, conducted in an industrial setting using the S7-1500 and S7CommPlus protocol.
The final segment focuses on Profinet protocol security and an injection attack scenario. The study demonstrates adversaries manipulating critical data without prior knowledge, causing harm to physical processes. A real-world attack on a Profinet-based system with two S7-300 PLCs is executed.
The thesis concludes by proposing mitigation solutions, enhancing PLC and communication protocol security. This contribution elevates the security posture of millions of operating devices globally, advancing PLC security research.
Energy efficiency is vital for future low-power electronic applications. This ultra-low power consumption requirement enables the research beyond the conventional charge-based memories. Further, reliability, high scalability, fast switching, CMOS compatibility, high endurance, etc., are some of the characteristics envisaged by the new generation of emerging non-volatile memories (NVMs). A memristor or OxRAM is one among the many emerging NVMs, which can exhibit the aforementioned characteristics, and it has the potential to replace the power-hungry conventional NVMs.
The memristive devices have the advantage of monolithic integration with the CMOS logic, which enables the widening of their application areas. Despite their various advantages, the reliability, forming voltages, and variability of the devices pose a hurdle to their wide commercial usage. Hence, it is crucial to identify these factors and mitigate them. This thesis addresses these issues through fabrication process improvements, electrical characterization techniques, and device-engineering methods.
The improvements in the fabrication processes reduced the pristine state currents of the memristive devices. It impacted the reliability and resistive switching performance of the memristive devices directly. To further improve the performance, the memristive devices are integrated into the 130 nm BiCMOS baseline technology of IHP. Additionally, dedicated test structures are developed to monitor and control the fabrication process steps through in-line electrical characterization.
Further, the forming current and voltage values, along with their dispersions in the 4 kbit memristive arrays, were reduced by utilizing the electrical characterization techniques. Accordingly, the forming operations were performed at high operating temperatures using incremental step pulse and verify algorithm (ISPVA). In contrast to the well-known method of increasing the current compliance (1R) or the gate voltage of the transistor (1T-1R) to increase the conduction filament size, a thin layer of Al2O3 is added. This device engineering technique reduced the variability in both LRS and HRS currents of the memristive devices. Additionally, the conduction filament properties in both states are modeled by using the quantum point contact (QPC) model. Finally, harnessing the intrinsic variability of the memristive devices for neuromorphic computing applications is demonstrated. The reliability of the devices is assessed through endurance and retention characteristics.
Numerical investigation and extension of quadrature-based moment methods for population balances
(2023)
Particulate systems can be described by a number density function (NDF) with respect to a vector of internal coordinates. The evolution of the NDF is governed by the typically high-dimensional population balance equation (PBE). A common approach to reduce the dimensionality of the problem is to solve only for a set of moments instead of the NDF. The derived system of moment equations, however, includes unclosed integral terms that still contain the unknown NDF. One way to close the system of moment equations is to approximate the unclosed integral terms using a Gaussian quadrature computed from the moments. The procedure of taking a set of moments to compute a Gaussian quadrature, which is, in turn, used to close the moment equations, is known as the quadrature method of moments (QMOM). It gave rise to an entire family of methods, the quadrature-based moment methods (QBMMs), which are the primary focus of this work. The presented research can be divided into three major parts. The first part involves the formulation of a common Lagrangian droplet breakup model for QBMMs and the numerical investigation with the QMOM as well as the more sophisticated extended QMOM (EQMOM). The results indicate that the approximations are reasonably accurate when at least six moment equations are solved, with the EQMOM providing no advantages for the investigated configurations. In the second part, a quadrature-based moment model for the effects of fluid turbulence on particle velocities is formulated. The resulting moment equations contain non-smooth integrands that are the source of large errors when using common QBMMs. As an alternative, the Gauss/anti-Gauss QMOM (GaG-QMOM) is proposed that uses the average of a Gaussian and an anti-Gaussian quadrature. Numerical studies show that the GaG-QMOM is able to significantly reduce the previously observed large errors. Another novelty proposed in this context is the modification of the second-order strong-stability preserving Runge-Kutta method to guarantee the preservation of moment realizability in the presence of phase-space diffusion. The third part is concerned with the numerical exploration of the core algorithm of most QBMMs in terms of performance and accuracy. The algorithm consists of, first, computing the recurrence coefficients of the orthogonal polynomials associated with a set of moments, second, solving a symmetric tridiagonal eigenvalue problem to obtain the quadrature nodes and weights, and third, evaluating the integral terms in the moment equations. The results indicate that the contribution of the first step to compute the recurrence coefficients from moments to the overall computational costs is negligible. Instead, the primary focus should be on the fast solution of the eigenvalue problem and, possibly, on the efficient implementation of the moment source term evaluation, which becomes important when second-order processes are considered.
The current global warming caused by the enormous negative effects of climate change rings alarm bells to humanity. It requires a colossal cooperation of scientific researchers and practitioners in all professions to invent innovating solutions to reduce the impact of global warming. In fact, the use of kinetic facades in architecture helps to save up to 50% of energy used in office space and to reduce 20% of CO2 emissions of entire building. Thus, how effective can the use of kinetic facades be in different climate regions? This research employs Grasshopper to design kinetic facades based on Minimal surfaces. DIVA 4.1 and LadyBug software based on the EnergyPlus are used to generate output data of energy use for cooling system of kinetic facade and 06 conventional facades in Berlin, Ho Chi Minh and Las Vegas in two SRES scenarios (A1FI and B1) of the IPCC in 2020, 2050 and 2080. The output data shows that the performance of the kinetic facade is approximately 40% higher than the facade with high-performance double glazing. Meaning, there is great potential to apply kinetic facades in various places on Earth in the current context of severe climate change.
Increased human activity, such as deforestation, is a major driver of biodiversity loss worldwide. In Cameroon, these activities could ultimately threaten the survival of the Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzee, but knowledge of their abundance and ecology in the Kom - Wum Forest Reserve in Cameroon is still lacking. This research aimed to estimate the population size of this chimpanzee subspecies and assess threats, investigate nesting behaviour, identify suitable habitats, determine feeding habits and document the tools used for food acquisition. Research was conducted using line transects during two seasons: wet (May-September 2018) and dry (November 2019-March 2020). Population size and threats were assessed by georeferencing signs of chimpanzees and human activity along line transects. Nesting behaviour was investigated by recording the characteristics of nesting trees along line transects and mapping their distribution in ArcGIS. Suitable habitat was identified by relating chimpanzee presence signs to local environmental variables related to relief, vegetation and human impact using the Maximum Entropy Species Distribution Model (MaxEnt). Feeding habits were investigated by direct examination of chimpanzee faeces, and tool use was documented by observation and measurement of tools in situ. The reserve is home to up to 83 chimpanzees. Signs of chimpanzee activity were significantly higher in mature forest than in secondary forest, and above 1000 m than below 1000 m. Hunting was the main threat to chimpanzees, and the occurrence of chimpanzee signs decreased significantly with increasing human activity. Chimpanzees preferred tall, mature forest trees at higher elevations with slopes for nesting, and avoided areas near villages and bare land. Only 8% of the study area was suitable chimpanzee habitat. Fruit dominated the chimpanzees' diet, but they also consumed leaves and fruit pith, especially during the dry season. There was also indirect evidence that chimpanzees used tools to consume driver ants (genus Dorylus). Seasonality significantly affected the size of tools used by chimpanzees for driver ant predation. They preferred to use thicker and shorter tools for driver ant predation during the rainy season, whereas longer and thinner tools were used during the dry season. The results of this research highlight the need to reduce poaching and deforestation to protect the remaining chimpanzee population and suitable habitat in the reserve and surrounding unprotected forest. High-elevation and mature forests are critical for chimpanzee conservation and should be a high priority for protection. This research has filled the knowledge gap on what little was known about the abundance and ecology of Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzees.
Physics-informed neural networks (PINN) are machine-learning methods that have been proved to be very successful and effective for solving governing equations of fluid flow. In this work we develop a robust and efficient model within this framework and apply it to a series of two-dimensional three-component (2D3C) stereo particle-image velocimetry datasets, to reconstruct the mean velocity field and correct measurements errors in the data. Within this framework, the PINNsbased model solves the Reynolds-averaged-Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations for zeropressure-gradient turbulent boundary layer (ZPGTBL) without a prior assumption and only taking the data at the PIV domain boundaries. The TBL data has different flow conditions upstream of the measurement location due to the effect of an applied flow control via uniform blowing. The developed PINN model is very robust, adaptable and independent of the upstream flow conditions due to different rates of wall-normal blowing while predicting the mean velocity quantities simultaneously. Hence, this approach enables improving the mean-flow quantities by reducing errors in the PIV data. For comparison, a similar analysis has been applied to numerical data obtained from a spatially-developing ZPGTBL and an adverse-pressure-gradient (APG) TBL over a NACA4412 airfoil geometry. The PINNs-predicted results have less than 1% error in the streamwise velocity and are in excellent agreement with the reference data. This shows that PINNs has potential applicability to shear-driven turbulent flows with different flow histories, which includes experiments and numerical simulations for predicting high-fidelity data.
The central theme of this thesis revolves around the impacts of historic charcoal burning on todays soils and soil landscapes in Connecticut, USA. The first chapter gives an overview of the state-of-research regarding the spatial distribution, morphology and chemical- as well as physical soil composition of so called relict charcoal hearth (RCH) landforms. RCHs can be described as unique soil microhabitats in the context of flora and fauna growth. The central research aim of the thesis is led by the question: How and to what extend does the historical charcoal industry control the distribution, development and properties of present day soils in Connecticut, USA? This thesis presents results from two field-campaigns in 2017 and 2018 where 52 RCH sites were surveyed and sampled in Litchfield County, Connecticut. The resulting dataset comprises of more than 1245 soil samples from 154 soil profiles and detailed stratigraphic and morphometrical information for all RCH sites. RCH landforms result in three distinct soils: charcoal rich horizons (Auh horizons), mineral soil horizons dividing multiple Auh horizons horizontally (Cu horizons) and buried former topsoil’s (Ahb horizons) or buried mineral soil horizons (Bwb horizons). Sites on flat terrain (< 4° slope) have mostly one Auh horizon, while sites on steeper terrain (> 4° slope) have mostly two, sometimes up to three Auh horizons. The total volume of sites on slopes is positively correlated to the local slope, i.e. it increases with larger steepness of the terrain. Compared to reference soils, RCH soils are enriched in total soil organic carbon and especially in pyrogenic carbon. Vertical gradients of organic carbon concentrations in Auh and Cu horizons suggest an enrichment of non-pyrogenic organic matter in the topsoil and a vertical translocation of highly aromatic carbon compounds into intermediate and buried soil horizons. Furthermore, Auh horizons have a lower bulk density, a higher crystallinity ratio (Fed/Fet) of pedogenic iron oxides and are enriched in exchangeable elements (Ca2+, Mg2+, Mn2+) as well as oxalate extractable manganese-oxides compared to reference soils. A deep-learning based automated mapping workflow called ARCHMAGE (Automated Relict Charcoal Hearth Mapping and Geospatial Exploration) was created to gain a continuous, state wide database of RCH sites locations and other relevant geospatial information. This database, in combination with calculation of site specifics RCH volumes and soil carbon stocks, showed that in regions with high RCH site densities, significant additions to local soil organic and especially pyrogenic carbon stocks are present. This effect is scale dependent, with a larger effect size on county scale and below (≤ 1:650,000).
Additive technologies are now widely used for the production of complex precise parts and have high potential for the production of forming dies. In this work, hot-forming dies optimized for additive manufacturing were developed and produced with wire arc direct energy deposition (WA-DED) and laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) technologies. The concept of lightweight hot-forming dies with a 2D-lattice structure was developed, which reduced the weight of each die by 56%, from 14.2 kg to 6.1 kg, in production using L-PBF. Maraging/precipitation-hardened steel 17-4PH was used as an alternative to traditional hot-working steels with slightly lower mechanical properties and a much higher processability in the additive manufacturing process. The workability of the manufactured dies was confirmed by forging tests on an industrial screw press.
The very soft and flow-permeable plumage is among the special adaptations of the owl that the silent flight is attributed to. Using a specially designed apparatus that provides a low-speed volume flow of air through a small sample of porous materials, measurements of the air flow permeability were performed in accordance to ISO 9053 on a total of 39 prepared wing specimen from six different bird species, including three species of silently flying owls and three non-silently flying bird species. The resulting data set described in the present paper contains the static airflow resistance measured at different positions on the wing.
A classic approach for solving differential equations with neural networks builds upon neural forms, which employ the differential equation with a discretisation of the solution domain. Making use of neural forms for time-dependent differential equations, one can apply the recently developed method of domain segmentation. That is, the domain may be split into several subdomains, on which the optimisation problem is solved. In classic adaptive numerical methods, the mesh as well as the domain may be refined or decomposed, in order to improve the accuracy. Also, the degree of approximation accuracy may be adapted. Therefore, it is desirable to transfer such important and successful strategies to the field of neural-network-based solutions. In the presented work, we propose a novel adaptive neural approach to meet this aim for solving time-dependent problems. To this end, each subdomain is reduced in size until the optimisation is resolved up to a predefined training accuracy. In addition, while the neural networks employed are by default small, we propose a means to adjust also the number of neurons in an adaptive way. We introduce conditions to automatically confirm the solution reliability and optimise computational parameters whenever it is necessary. Results are provided for several initial-value problems that illustrate important computational properties of the method.
The Accra Metropolis of Ghana has experienced rapid urban expansion over the past decades. Agricultural and forest-lands have been transformed into urban/built-up areas. This study analysed urban expansion and its relationship with the temperature of Accra from 1986 to 2022. Multi-source datasets such as remote sensing (RS) and other ancillary data were utilised. Land use land cover (LULC) maps were produced employing the random forests classifier. Land surface temperature (LST) and selected d(RS) Indices were extracted. Regression techniques assessed the interplay between LST and remote sensing indices. The LULC maps revealed increasing trends in the urban/built-up areas at the expense of the other LULC types. The analysis from the LST and the RS indices revealed a direct relationship between temperature and urban/built-up areas and an inverse relationship between temperature and vegetation. Thus, spatial urban expansion has modified the urban temperature of Accra. The integrated utilisation of RS and GIS demonstrated to be an efficient approach for analysing and monitoring urban expansion and its relationship with temperature.
The permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) can be a suitable candidate for electrified propulsion in aviation. Despite the very high efficiency, heat dissipation during operation leads to performance limitations. Elevated temperatures in the electrical insulations and the magnets pose a potential safety risk that must be reduced by selective cooling. A comprehensive review is conducted to capture current research interests in cooling methods in PMSM. Cooling methods are described according to their heat transfer mechanism, grouped, and assigned to the components within the motor. Key findings of the literature reviewed are described in the context of PMSM cooling. Information on cooling media and potential combinations of cooling methods in components is gathered. Assessment parameters such as safety, weight, effectiveness, integrability, complexity and cost are defined to enable a subsequent qualitative analysis for six selected cooling methods. A point-weighted evaluation approach, according to VDI 2225, was applied to identify the most promising cooling approach for successful implementation in aviation.
The present study deals with the phenomenological observation of the corrosion of the positive electrode foil of lithium-ion batteries containing LiNi0.6Co0.2Mn0.2O2 (NMC) as cathode material. Due to the presence of moisture, localized water accumulation is formed on the NMC surface. The water absorbed by the electrolyte reacts with the NMC under Li+/H+ exchange and the resulting pH increase leads to dissolution of the carrier foil and characteristic salt-like blooms on the NMC surface. With the increase in the relative area occupied by the holes in the aluminum foil per time, a sufficiently suitable parameter was found with which to quantitatively determine the extent of corrosion. The degree of degradation depends on time and ambient humidity. It was shown that functional recycling with the water jet method is no longer applicable for degraded foils, since the mechanical stability of the foils decreases as corrosion progresses. Lithium, aluminum, sulfur and oxygen were detected in the blooms using SEM–EDX and Laser-Induced-Breakdown-Spectroscopy (LIBS). The underlying NMC layer was found to contain mainly aluminum and significantly lower lithium content than the non-degraded material. SEM and Raman microscopy analyses also showed that the active material is also locally degraded and therefore no longer suitable for functional recycling.
Possible synergy between FLEGT-VPA & REDD+ towards improving forest governance framework in Cameroon
(2023)
Illegal logging is seen as a serious impediment to achieving sustainable management of forests in the tropics. In addition, deforestation contributes in increasing carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere, resulting to biodiversity loss and climate change. Illegal logging and deforestation have affected Cameroon’s forest ecosystem negatively since the mid-1980s as a result of the economic crises, which intensified the exploitation of forest resources for multiple purposes. In response, some policy initiatives came up such as FLEGT-VPA and REDD+ to fight against the threats. It is due to the above background that this study was designed to examine the possible synergy between FLEGT-VPA and REDD+ towards improving the forest governance framework in Cameroon. The first part of the study assesses FLEGT-VPA in Cameroon with the application of interviews of key informants who were involved in the negotiation process of the EU-Cameroon Voluntary Partnership Agreement. The second part of the study assesses the management of Bimbia Bonadikombo Community Forest (BBCF), as one of the REDD+ pilot project sites around Mount Cameroon in the South West Region of Cameroon. The use of surveys, content analysis, and observations seeks to assess these two initiatives in their role in improving forest governance in Cameroon. The first part of the research reveals that since Cameroon ratified the FLEGT-VPA in 2011, there has been progressed concerning stakeholder participation in forest-related issues. Again, the study also reveals challenges faced with the setting up of a system to verify timber from legal origin as recommended by the European Union. The research further reveals a lack of commitment by the government in revising the current forest policies and re-organizing the domestic market for timber trade as part of the commitment made by the government during the ratification of the FLEGT-VPA. The second part of the study finds that the management of BBCF is not governed by the provision of the Cameroon community forestry manual or by its bylaws posing doubts if community forestry can halt emissions of greenhouse gases caused by deforestation, thus helping REDD+ achieve its objectives. The study recommends the need for rapid policy reform and a cross-sectoral transformation to enable FLEGT-VPA and REDD+ to synergize for a better policy outcome on issues concerning forestry and climate change.
The next generation of civil turbofan engines targets the by-pass ratios of up to 20:1, requiring an innovative fan design with a low fan pressure ratio, low specific thrust and a radically increased fan diameter. The aerodynamic stability of such a large slow rotating fan is very sensitive against the back-pressure variations in the by-pass duct, especially during the take-off operations. The back-pressure regulation can be achieved significantly through a Variable Area Fan Nozzle (VAFN). This work deals with the design development of VAFN concepts for ultra-high by-pass ratio engines which was researched in EU funded program ENOVAL and received funding under grant agreement number 604999.
A system engineering approach was implemented for the VAFN development by following the requirements in conceptual, preliminary and detailed design phases. The design domains in the rear nacelle and under the core fairing were selected for the concept generation. Several qualitative and quantitative trade studies were conducted to down-select the best-fit solution during each design phase. These included the kinematic simulations of various types of VAFN modulations; analytical calculations to understand the thermodynamics of the selected VAFN kinematics; aerodynamic performance predictions using CFD simulations on a large number of preliminary designs; 3D CFD simulations for detailed performance assessments including the design optimization of individual features and distortions due to failed modulations; and FEM calculations for the topology generation and optimization of structural components. The overall weighted effect was determined for each output parameter and the results were presented in percentile changes relative to that with a fixed nozzle reference geometry.
Two VAFN concepts were selected for the final detailed design phase, Flaps in rear nacelle domain and Variable Inner Fairing Structure (VIFS). Both concepts showed better outputs in terms of specific fuel consumption, noise emission and fan’s safety margin during the take-off, with an over-area exhaust position than those with a fixed nozzle operation. During the climb phase, with an under-area VAFN position, both concepts resulted in drawbacks due to higher aerodynamic losses relative to the fixed nozzle. During MCR, both the VAFN concepts with stowed positions caused losses mainly due to leakages and higher structural weights relative to the fixed nozzle configuration. For each VAFN concept, a detailed system definition was developed and the function trees for each operation were explained. A discrete modulation type with two positions was described and recommended for both concepts. This included an over-area deployed position for the take-off phase and a stowed position for the rest of the flight, based on the beneficial performance of the VAFN concepts over the fixed clean nozzle configuration.
The creation of adequate simulation models for complex assemblies is an extensive process that requires a lot of experience, and on the other hand involves a multitude of manual, tedious tasks. These are significant obstacles for improving the process performance and capabilities. The objective of this research is to develop methods which digitally imitate the way of thoughts of the engineer in the design process towards a digital system understanding and which support the automation of the involved manual workflow.
This thesis presents a strategy to translate engineering reasoning and actions to an equivalent in the computer domain. A cardinal step is to gain understanding of system arrangements, boundary conditions and its components. Based on this evaluation, the identification of assembly parts is forming the foundation for optimized process chains for the transfer to the analysis environment. Model complexity relates to computational effort, which in turn affects model capabilities and manageability. To achieve a satisfactory compromise of model quality and complexity, this transfer process is strongly dependent on the visual analysis, reasoning and manual implementation of skilled engineers.
The principle of translating engineering logics is pursued from the assembly system to its smallest parts. Component segmentation methods allow subdividing regions of interest into substructures which are assigned with a feature vector. This vector comprises metrics describing the substructures with regard to specific aspects and is the key decision point for subsequent steps as idealization, suitable Finite-Element modeling and ultimately building an analysis model. The created system database is continuously maintained and supports these process chains as well as the final setup of the assembly simulation model.
An automated workflow like this implies advantages for efficiency, but also creates opportunities for further use cases. This workflow has been exploited for generating a training data set from the different simulation variants as a basis to a knowledge representation imitating engineering experience. An algorithm from the graph neural network field is applied to this data set as a conceptual approach. The intention pursued in this concept is to model the learning progress about estimating the influence of modelling decisions on simulation results and quality.
This research proposes a holistic strategy and describes methods to achieve the objectives of decreasing manual effort, introducing an automated and geometry-based process and digitally replicating engineering experience by introducing a knowledge database.
Assessing authenticity in heritage conservation : case study : architectural conservation in Bahrain
(2023)
The thesis complements the authenticity discourse in heritage conservation with the perspective of laypeople and evaluates the pertinent methodology for the application of the normative concept in architectural heritage conservation. Based on the Nara Document on Authenticity, the Operational Guidelines for the Implementation of the World Heritage Convention anchor the concept in the credibility and truthfulness of internal and external factors – referred to as information sources – that communicate a heritage site’s cultural values. Conversely, the author explored the truthfulness of messages conveyed to site users in a qualitative research based on interviews focused on two urban reference sites in Bahrain. These stand for different eras and conservation approaches: the ensemble of colonial-style governmental buildings at Bab al-Bahrain in Manama and the vernacular Siyadi Shops in the market area Suq al-Qaisariya in Muharraq, which were restored in the course of a World Heritage nomination. The interpretive content analysis compares how architects and non-architects, who represent laypeople in architectural conservation, perceived their authenticity and also traces cultural contingencies. The empirical data confirms pronounced differences in the way architects and non-architects perceive authenticity but only a few between representatives of so-called Western and Eastern cultures. Assessed against international heritage conservation standards, the site in Muharraq proved more authentic than the one in Manama. However, the meanings produced in the interaction between the sites and the interviewees proved be of limited truthfulness in both cases. A key finding is hence that a constructivist authenticity concept can serve no normative function when heritage conservation is considered a discipline at the service of historiography. While all potential factors of authenticity as per the Nara Document proved to be relevant, perceived material authenticity was found to be an outstanding reason why the site in Muharraq was appreciated more. Its rehabilitation was found to successfully reconcile essentialist and constructivist authenticity understandings by paying tribute both to the documentary value of the historic site and to the experiential needs of its users. The findings support the ICOMOS Venice Charter’s material-focused approach while confirming the relevance of a broadened authenticity understanding and highlighting the importance of integrated, participatory approaches to heritage conservation. By illustrating the importance of expertise when assessing the authenticity of architectural heritage, the findings at the same time flag limits to democratizing architectural conservation practice. The author recommends developing practice-oriented guidance for the assessment of authenticity of heritage sites based on further research and to add interpretation facilities to the list of factors of authenticity.
This thesis deals with strategies for achieving high data throughput in wireless sensor networks that use a time division multiple access (TDMA) scheme to resolve medium access. The thesis uses a multi-sided approach that deals not only with the scheduling algorithm but also with the network layer and the interference model. The thesis proposes four solutions that significantly improve data throughput, fairness, and latency in the considered scenario.
The thesis starts with an overview of state-of-the-art medium access control (MAC) protocols, emphasizing TDMA. Based on this overview, it is concluded that not much space for improvement is left in the field of schedule calculation algorithms; many such algorithms are proposed up to date, and they can achieve schedule lengths close to the theoretical minimum. However, the research also reveals a lack of in-detail evaluation and comparison of these algorithms; this makes choosing the most suitable algorithm for a particular application hard and performance estimation inaccurate. Therefore, an extensive evaluation of state-of-the-art TDMA protocols using simulations and over 200 randomly generated networks was performed to tackle this issue. The results allow choosing an appropriate algorithm and estimating performance for each specific application.
Next, the problem of multiple packet transmissions during a single time slot is analyzed. State-of-the-art TDMA protocols assume that one packet can be transmitted in each slot and optimize the number of slots each node gets under this assumption. However, when nodes can transmit more than one packet, the performance of such a schedule is impaired. To solve this, the M-TreeMAC protocol is proposed; this protocol considers the actual number of packets transmitted in a time slot and optimizes the schedule accordingly. Furthermore, it is observed that the routing topology heavily impacts the schedule length created using this algorithm; an algorithm that optimizes the topology to result in the shortest schedule when M-TreeMAC is used is proposed, increasing benefits even further.
Finally, the accuracy of the 2-hop interference model, commonly used by state-of-the-art TDMA scheduling algorithms, is studied and simulated using a realistic radio model based on measurement results. The results show high packet loss ratios for packets traveling a large number of hops to reach the sink. The adaptive interference model is proposed to improve the 2-hop interference model. The proposed model can increase throughput significantly in networks with a height of ten or more hops.
Background: Food sustainability is becoming increasingly important for the achievement of sustainable development goals, especially in light of recent global challenges of climate change, geopolitical conflict and the increasing vulnerability of food systems. The world is emphasising the importance of holistic approaches to agriculture and food systems to tackle these challenges. Germany’s Sustainable Development Strategy for 2030 associates SDGs 2, 3 12 and 15 with sustainable agriculture and food systems as crucial elements to achieve these goals. However, with the lack of knowledge in this area, and the scarcity of tools to monitor and assess food sustainability, it has become crucial to investigate potential holistic approaches and frameworks to assess the sustainability of food systems.
Purpose: This study uses the national framework of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as the only available valid holistic framework, to explore the sustainability of the bread system in Germany. It operationalises the SDGs to bakery level to identify significant indicators that could, potentially, be used to assess the sustainability of artisan bakeries, and identify to which SDGs the bakeries contribute.
Methods: This study utilises a mixed-methods research design to address the multi-disciplinary nature of the food sustainability concept. It critically evaluates the SDG framework and identifies a set of indicators, which are expanded with further indicators to address the cultural dimension of bread as a cultural heritage. To collect data, a 26-item questionnaire was issued to 586 artisan bakeries with a response rate of 8.8% (n = 52); the 52 bakeries own 562 branches. This was followed by interviews with an acceptance rate of 19% (n = 10). Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse the quantitative data, while the interviews were transcribed from German to English and coded using NVivo 11.
Results: Sustainable bread is redefined from a holistic perspective encompassing theory, policies and artisan bakeries. The results confirm that bakeries positively contribute to bread sustainability in Germany, as well as towards achieving the national SDGs. Progress areas include energy efficiency, sustainable packaging, local procurement, heritage promotion, waste reduction and ecolabels. Interestingly, individual bakeries appear to be slightly more sustainable than chains due to their flexibility in adapting to new practices and their use of organic products; however, chain bakeries are slightly less sustainable, but are proven to be more efficient in terms of productivity and market reach.
People in a social network are connected, and their homogeneity is reflected by the similarity of their attributes. For effective clustering, the similarities among people within a cluster must be much higher than the similarities between different clusters. Traditional clustering algorithms like hierarchical (agglomerative) or k-medoids take distances between objects as input and find clusters of objects. The distance functions used should comply with the triangle inequality (TI) property, but sometimes this property may be violated, thus negatively impacting the quality of the generated clusters.
However, in social networks, meaningful clusters can be found even though TI violates. One possibility is a quantum-logic-based clique-guided non-TI clustering approach. The commuting quantum query language (CQQL) is the base for this approach. The CQQL allows the formulation of queries that incorporate both Boolean and similarity conditions. It calculates the similarity value between two objects.
Furthermore, attributes may not have equal impact on similarity and affect the resulting clusters. CQQL incorporates weights to express the varying importance of sub-conditions in a query while preserving consistency with Boolean algebra. This enables personalization of results through relevance feedback (RF).
The main challenge of comparing clusterings is that there is no ground truth data. In such situations, human-generated gold standard clustering can be used. The question is how to compare the performance of clusterings. A noteworthy technique involves counting the pairs of objects that are grouped identically in both clusterings. By doing so, a clustering distance is calculated that measures the dissimilarity.
To validate the non-TI clustering approach, experiments are conducted on social networks of different sizes. Three central questions are addressed by the experiments mentioned: first, is it possible to find meaningful clusters even though TI violates; second, how does a user interact with the system to provide feedback based on their needs; and third, how fast do the detected clusters based on the proposed approach converge to the ideal solution?
To sum up, the experiments’ objective is to demonstrate the validity of a theoretical approach. The research findings presented here provide sufficient evidence for detecting meaningful clusters based on user interaction. Furthermore, the experiments clearly demonstrate that the non-TI clustering approach can be used as an RF technique in clustering.
The present research aims to analyze the possibilities of introducing the living “Intangible Cultural Heritage” as Supplement of Knowledge into the formal educational system particularly the Early Childhood Education in the Far North Region of Cameroon - irrespective of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage and the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. This Region is purposively selected for its stronghold of multifarious and diverse ethno-cultural (id)entities and citadel of the country’s enshrined traditions. The rural area of Kolara is conveniently chosen to explore how to blend the receding ethno-cultural heritage with the formal education system in accordance with the aim of education in Cameroon and therefore could be an example of how to train citizens firmly rooted in their cultures but also opened to the world. It presupposes that the current formal primary educational system is not constructive for primary school starters. On the basis of a combination of participatory research and systematic data collection methods, three educational heritages could be outlined: the ethno-cultural traditional educations specific to the two major ethno-cultures Tupuri and Fulbé and the Islamic Arabic educational heritage peculiar to Muslims, predominantly Fulbé. In this context, it could be determined to what extend the formal education is ethno-cultural specific, environment related and learner centered.
In the time of increased awareness about the environment problems by the public opinion and also intensive international efforts to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, as well increase of the generation of electrical energy to facilitate industrial growth, the conference offers broad contribution towards achieving the goals of diversification and sustainable development.
Focus of the student conference is to promote the discussion of views from scientists and students from Wroclaw University of Technology, Technical University of Ostrava and Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg.
The conference is a unique teaching session motivating the students to write science related papers, prepare presentations and discus future developments. It is a formal part of the curriculum offered as an elective module, accompanied by a technical excursion.
During open-cast lignite mining in Lusatia (NE Germany), iron sulfide minerals associated with lignite, are exposed to air and weather. The weathering products iron (Fe), sulfate and acids subsequently enter the fluvial-lacustrine system Spree and its tributaries.
The aim of this work was to identify and explain the evolving biogeochemical signatures (spatio-temporal patterns) in River Spree. These signatures are significantly influenced by biogeochemical turnover processes triggered by iron input. To identify the signatures, a regional field study was conducted from the inland delta Spreewald to the mouth. This study was followed by two laboratory experiments under controlled redox conditions to investigate the effect of Fe on the long-term binding of phosphorus and the degradation of particulate organic material in the iron-enriched sediments.
Characteristic elements introduced by lignite mining (iron, sulfur, aluminum, cobalt, nickel) and by urban areas (zinc, lead, copper, chromium) could be determined by means of a principal component analysis. Based on these findings, the impact range of the open-cast mining was determined to be at least ~ 90 km downstream of the Spreewald. Within the urban-influenced systems Fürstenwalde and Berlin, the urban signature is more dominant than the mining signature. By means of sequential extractions and XRD analyses of the sediments, iron binding forms and characteristic iron minerals have been additionally identified (e.g., Fe(III) oxyhydroxides, pyrite, vivianite).
Sediment analyses and column experiments have shown that iron increases the phosphorus sorption and decreases the phosphorus release in the sediments of three studied lakes of the fluvial-lacustrine system. However, the application of different phosphorus retention models for Lake Neuendorfer See showed that Fe cannot reduce the eutrophic state of the lakes along the river, since the water retention times are too short and the external phosphorus loads are too high. Additionally, lake sediments with different Fe contents have been incubated with particulate organic material. Higher Fe contents resulted in reduced emissions of the greenhouse gases CO₂ and CH₄, which can be attributed to a reduced degradation of organic matter by Fe. Possible reasons include sorption processes of (dissolved) organic matter onto Fe oxyhydroxides and toxic effects of iron on microorganisms. Nevertheless, Fe (and sulfate) are available as electron acceptors during the decomposition of organic matter in River Spree.
The findings of this work deepen the understanding of the impact of iron from mining on sulfur, phosphorus and carbon turnover processes in fluvial-lacustrine systems. As a consequence of the Fe input from the Lusatian area, the signature will persist for decades in River Spree.
In this work, a reliable kinetic reaction mechanism was revised to accurately reproduce the detailed reaction paths of steam reforming of methane over a Ni/Al2O3 catalyst. A steadystate fixed-bed reactor experiment and a 1D reactor catalyst model were utilized for this task. The distinctive feature of this experiment is the possibility to measure the axially resolved temperature profile of the catalyst bed, which makes the reaction kinetics inside the reactor visible. This allows for understanding the actual influence of the reaction kinetics on the system; while pure gas concentration measurements at the catalytic reactor outlet show near-equilibrium conditions, the inhere presented temperature profile shows that it is insufficient to base a reaction mechanism development on close equilibrium data. The new experimental data allow for achieving much higher quality in the modeling efforts. Additionally, by carefully controlling the available active surface via dilution in the experiment, it was possible to slow down the catalyst conversion rate, which helped during the adjustment of the reaction kinetics. To assess the accuracy of the revised mechanism, a monolith experiment from the literature was simulated. The results show that the fitted reaction mechanism was able to accurately predict the experimental outcomes for various inlet mass flows, temperatures, and steam-to-carbon ratios.
Recent advances in additive manufacturing offer promising opportunities for the fabrication of structures on existing micro-(opto-acoustic )electro-mechanical systems, i.e., chips. This is of particular significance in research and development due to the adaptability and adaptation speed of additive manufacturing. These advantages provide the ability to individualize the fabrication of structures and to enable the rapid prototyping approach. The combination of additive manufacturing on chip already enables current research, especially in photonic and microfluidic fields. Despite this, additive manufacturing on chip has never been applied to acoustic sensors or micro-positioning chips. Such devices could benefit from the mentioned advantages, especially for the fabrication of beam shaping waveguides, packaging, grating and end effector structures. Additive manufacturing by two-photon polymerization lithography gathers interest in industry and research due to its capabilities for the fabrication of structures with minimum feature sizes beyond the diffraction limit. The objective of this work is the investigation of additive manufacturing on chip by two-photon polymerization lithography at the example of an acoustic sensor and a micro-positioning chip. One of the greatest challenges is posed by the optical, thermodynamic, adhesion and alignment effects, which are introduced to the fabrication process by these complex substrates. Optical and thermodynamic models were established, and simulations were performed, culminating in a compensation method to address these effects, which was verified by parameter studies. The substrate alignment was investigated via optical technique, resulting in the development, manufacturing and verification of a novel alignment upgrade to the fabrication system employed in this work. The influence of process materials posed another challenge, as they led to chip performance alterations and restrictions. Chips treated with these materials were characterized, e.g., using high frequency optical microphones. Owing to the high precision of the alignment upgrade and the compensation method developed in this work, additive manufacturing on chip using two-photon polymerization lithography on the investigated devices was reported for the first time and presented for expedient examples, e.g., waveguides, end effectors and gratings. The residue contamination was determined as the main origin of the exhibited performance issues. Development strategies were recommended for further research, to enable additive manufacturing on chip insensitive to residual materials. In this work, the requirements for additive manufacturing on chip were illustrated and the fundamental arrangement to enable the rapid prototyping approach as well as design individualization were demonstrated. The compensation methods developed in this work facilitate upcoming research on desirable chip types that form the basis for optical and microfluidic applications.
With the large-scale expansion of decentralized power generation from renewable energy resources (RES) and reduction of fossil fuel-based power generation, this leads to fundamental structural changes in the power supply system. The transition is characterized by a shift from central to decentral, from directional to bi-directional. As the share of renewable power systems in the electricity grid increases, the inherent uncertainty of renewable energies poses challenges to the grid system’s stability.
To achieve increased efficiency, decarbonisation, decentralization, and digitisation in energy sector, a flexible and resilient energy system is required. Electrical energy data and non-electrical energy data are generated from various sources, including the supervisory control and data acquisition system (SCADA), geographic information system (GIS), and weather information system. Based on these data, different spatial and temporal models of energy systems and their databases are created and connected. This thesis contributes to the analysis of regional power performance. To this end, an efficient simplified grid-oriented network cluster is presented to account for the regional allocation of RES power systems. The model clustering includes the grid topology, temporal and spatial resolution, and the structure of electrical and non-electrical data. This approach contributes to methodological aspects of energy system modelling and analysis.
In addition, based on the proposed cluster model, this thesis presents the physical profile-based and data-driven methods to estimate the regional large-scale photovoltaic (PV) and wind power generations. In order to adapt to the spatial-temporal heterogeneity of the regional renewable power generations and to improve the local power utilization rate, this thesis conducts empirical analyses of the regional energy storage and combined PV and wind power systems using cable pooling with shared grid connection.
In summary, this thesis presents a flexible modelling approach that takes into account the regional allocation of renewable power systems and enables a more accurate estimation of regional power generation. The proposed model and analytical methods can help the efficiency and resiliency of the energy system and support the transition towards renewable energies.
Bored children begin to draw, do crafts, to fidget - or they do something bad. Others fall silent, withdraw, or become lethargic. Research on school-related boredom has focused primarily on the negative consequences of boredom, such as decreased cognitive performance, motivation or attentativeness, or disruptiveness. These negative aspects of boredom can be contrasted by the notion that boredom can promote creative performance. This paper reflects on boredom's creative and suppressive consequences as an interplay of personality traits and behavioral possibilities in school situations, on the one hand, and as an interplay of situational experiences with constituent developmental processes on the other. It is proposed that boredom is a gauge of the learner's resonance with school content, learning and/or developmental relationships. Boredom indicates a psychological need and its desideratum. Thus, both creative and suppressive potentials are inherent in boredom.
Result-based payments (RBPs) reward land users for conservation outcomes and are a promising alternative to standard payments, which are targeted at specific land use measures. A major barrier to the implementation of RBPs, particularly for the conservation of mobile species, is the substantial monitoring cost. Passive acoustic monitoring may offer promising opportunities for low-cost monitoring as an alternative to human observation. We develop a costing framework for comparing human observation and passive acoustic monitoring and apply it to a hypothetical RBP scheme for farmland bird conservation. We consider three different monitoring scenarios: daytime monitoring for the whinchat and the ortolan bunting, nighttime monitoring for the gray partridge and the common quail, and day-and-night monitoring for all four species. We also examine the effect of changes in relevant parameters (such as participating area, travel distance and required monitoring time) on the cost comparison. Our results show that passive acoustic monitoring is still more expensive than human observation for daytime monitoring. In contrast, passive acoustic monitoring has a cost advantage for nighttime as well as day-and-nighttime monitoring in all considered scenarios.
As the issue of pollutant emissions from aviation propulsion escalates, research into alternative powertrains is gaining momentum. Two promising technologies are the Hybrid Electric Propulsion System (HEPS) and Pressure Gain Combustion (PGC). HEPS is expected to reduce pollutant emissions by decreasing fuel consumption, whereas PGC uses detonation in the combustor to increase the thermal efficiency of engines by elevating the total pressure during combustion. This study extensively explores the integration of these two emerging technologies, thoroughly assessing the advantages that arise from their combination. First, the renowned turboprop engine PW127 is benchmarked and modeled using Gasturb software. The model is integrated into Simulink using the T-MATS tool, with HEPS and pressure gain components added to analyze the thermodynamics of various configurations under different pressure gain values and HEPS parameters. The analysis, conducted up to the cruise phase of the baseline aircraft, reveals that applying pressure gain combustion through Rotating Detonation Combustion (RDC) results in a more significant increase in efficiency and decrease in fuel consumption compared to HEPS with conventional gas turbines. However, HEPS helps maintain a more uniform combustor inlet condition and reduces the Turbine Inlet Temperature (TIT) at the takeoff phase, where the highest TIT otherwise occurs. The results suggest that integrating HEPS with PGC can be beneficial in maintaining optimal combustor conditions and mitigating turbine efficiency degradation.
The role of AJB35136 and fdtA genes in biofilm formation by avian pathogenic Escherichia coli
(2023)
Background Infections caused by avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC) result in significant economic losses in poultry industry. APEC strains are known to form biofilms in various conditions allowing them to thrive even under harsh and nutrient-deficient conditions on different surfaces, and this ability enables them to evade chemical and biological eradication methods. Despite knowing the whole genome sequences of various APEC isolates, little has been reported regarding their biofilm-associated genes. A random transposon mutant library of the wild-type APEC IMT 5155 comprising 1,300 mutants was analyzed for biofilm formation under nutrient deprived conditions using Videoscan technology coupled with fluorescence microscopy. Seven transposon mutants were found to have reproducibly and significantly altered biofilm formation and their mutated genes were identified by arbitrary PCR and DNA sequencing. The intact genes were acquired from the wild-type strain, cloned in pACYC177 plasmid and transformed into the respective altered biofilm forming transposon mutants, and the biofilm formation was checked in comparison to the wild type and mutant strains under the same conditions.
Results In this study, we report seven genes i.e., nhaA, fdeC, yjhB, lysU, ecpR, AJB35136 and fdtA of APEC with significant contribution to biofilm formation. Reintroduction of AJB35136 and fdtA, reversed the altered phenotype proving that a significant role being played by these two O-antigen related genes in APEC biofilm formation. Presence of these seven genes across nonpathogenic E. coli and APEC genomes was also analyzed showing that they are more prevalent in the latter.
Physiotherapy for patients with hip and knee osteoarthritis in Germany: a survey of current practice
(2023)
Osteoarthritis (OA) of the hip and the knee is common and leads to pain, stiffness and disability. Clinical practice guidelines (CPG) provide recommendations to assist healthcare professionals in clinical decision-making. Although evidence-based physiotherapy has been shown to be effective in the management OA, a gap between clinical practice and guideline recommendations exists. Little is known about OA management provided by physiotherapists in Germany and whether treatment aligns with CPGs. The objectives of this study were (1) to investigate the current physiotherapy practice in patients with hip and/or knee OA in Germany, (2) to evaluate physiotherapists’ adherence to guideline recommendations and (3) to explore barriers and facilitators to guideline use.
Titanium nitride (TiN) is a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) compatible material with large potential for the fabrication of plasmonic structures suited for device integration. However, the comparatively large optical losses can be detrimental for application. This work reports a CMOS compatible TiN nanohole array (NHA) on top of a multilayer stack for potential use in integrated refractive index sensing with high sensitivities at wavelengths between 800 and 1500 nm. The stack, consisting of the TiN NHA on a silicon dioxide (SiO2) layer with Si as substrate (TiN NHA/SiO2/Si), is prepared using an industrial CMOS compatible process. The TiN NHA/SiO2/Si shows Fano resonances in reflectance spectra under oblique excitation, which are well reproduced by simulation using both finite difference time domain (FDTD) and rigorous coupled-wave analysis (RCWA) methods. The sensitivities derived from spectroscopic characterizations increase with the increasing incident angle and match well with the simulated sensitivities. Our systematic simulation-based investigation of the sensitivity of the TiN NHA/SiO2/Si stack under varied conditions reveals that very large sensitivities up to 2305 nm per refractive index unit (nm RIU−1) are predicted when the refractive index of superstrate is similar to that of the SiO2 layer. We analyze in detail how the interplay between plasmonic and photonic resonances such as surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs), localized surface plasmon resonances (LSPRs), Rayleigh Anomalies (RAs), and photonic microcavity modes (Fabry-Pérot resonances) contributes to this result. This work not only reveals the tunability of TiN nanostructures for plasmonic applications but also paves the way to explore efficient devices for sensing in broad conditions.
Christoph Dientzenhofer (1655–1722) is considered one of the most important Baroque master builders of Central Europe. From his extensive architectural oeuvre, a group of six church buildings with geometrically complex forms stands out, recognised by architectural historians as particularly innovative and influential. These churches, located in Bohemia (Czech Republic), and often collectively referred to as the ‘radical’, ‘dynamic’, ‘Guarinesque’, or simply ‘Bohemian’ group, are: St. Joseph in Obořiště (1702–11), the Castle Church in Smiřice (1702–11), St. Nicholas in the Lesser Town of Prague (1703–11), St. Clare in Cheb (1707–11), St. Margaret in Břevnov (1708–16), and the Church of the Holy Assumption in Nová Paka (1709–24). The brick vaults of these six buildings, sequences of oval domes and double-curved vault areas, are of particular interest for building research. In this study, the geometric design of the vaults of Dientzenhofer’s ‘radical’ churches is documented, analysed, and compared using 3D laser scans of the buildings as primary source. The 3D models generated from the scans enable a geometric analysis through the method of reverse geometric engineering, breaking down the vaults’ complex three-dimensional forms into their basic two-dimensional components: segments of circles with different radii and orientations, curved in one or two directions. These forms can be found in the architectural and stereotomic treatises that were widespread at the time. By comparing the vault geometry of the six churches with each other and with the geometric concepts discussed in the treatises, general statements can be made about the architect’s design choices. On the basis of this investigation, hypotheses are made about the design and underlying geometric ideas of the vaults of Dientzenhofer’s ‘radical group’, and the results are placed in context.
1. Memristor-Symposium 2023
(2023)
The 1.Memristor-Symposium was held from 27-28.02.2023 in Bamberg. Young scientists and PhD students presented their research and covered several topics regarding ongoing memristive research in Germany. Several talks on the topic of memristive devices, their testing, modeling and usage were presented and discussed, covering the whole vertical integration from material and divice up to application level.
To increase our understanding of bacterial intestinal colonization in animal populations lacking anthropogenic influence we devised the first objective and studied the diversity of E. coli in pristine wild animal population. Overall, E. coli in cormorants maintained a high diversity under minimal anthropogenic influences. E. coli were isolated from individual birds of two cormorant colonies located on small islands in lakes at least 100 km away from human settlements. Diversity of the isolates was studied using pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). 137 isolates of cormorant colony-1 and 75 isolates of cormorant colony-2 resulted in 60 and 33 PFGE types, respectively. Representative strains of each PFGE type were analysed in terms of phylogroups, extraintestinal virulence associated genes (exVAGs), adhesion to the chicken intestinal cell line and antimicrobials. Most isolates belonged to phylogroup B1 (68.3%) followed by B2 and E with B2 harbouring the highest total number of exVAGs per isolate. Surprisingly, a PFGE type with relatively few exVAGs displayed the highest isolation frequency, also showing a high adhesion rate. Comparative analysis of exVAGs to other E. coli populations of wildlife origin revealed that the secreted autotransporter toxin encoding sat gene was only present in cormorants.
The second objective was to characterize and identify factors contributing to the novel adhesion phenotype, known as Clumpy adhesion by the strain 4972 E. coli when incubated on human urinary bladder 5637 cell line. Transcriptome and proteome of adhered bacteria clustered together and diverged from bacteria in the supernatant. The clumpy structure was further explored in terms antibiotic stress where sessile structures could tolerate high antibiotic pressure of ampicillin up to 16 mg/ml and gentamicin up to 2 µg/ml. Data analysis unveiled differential expression of 623 genes between bacteria forming clumps and in supernatant. 148 genes were hypothetical and five hypothetical genes i.e., ffp, espX1, pilV, spnT and yggT along with four known genes i.e., dnaK, spy, flgH and fimH were targeted for deletion. Seven genes deletion mutants, three known (i.e., spy, flgH and fimH) and four hypothetical (ffp, pilV, spnT and yggT) genes were successfully generated and analysed for various parameters. ΔflgH showed loss of clumpy phenotype and adhesion ability up to 80% was regenerated by complementation. When antibiotic stress by ampicillin was applied after clump formation, Δffp depicted no effect of high concentration of ampicillin. In case of ΔpilV, adhesion significantly increased to 151% and upon complementation, adhesion was reduced to 53%. ΔspnT during ampicillin stressed adhesion fared almost 8.5 times better than the wild type strain. ΔyggT exhibited high adhesion of 145.5 % and upon reintroduction, adhesion decreased to 13%. Overall, we were able characterize a new phenotype and determined the role of genes contributing to clumpy adhesion phenotype.
This doctoral research examines community participation in decision-making for Cultural Heritage Tourism (CHT) in Nizamuddin Basti and Shahjahanabad, historical sites in New Delhi, India. It includes three papers addressing community participation barriers, resident motivation, and collective action dilemmas using the Institutional Analysis and Development-Network of Adjacent Action Situations (IAD-NAAS) framework.
The study identifies four main barriers: institutional constraints, limited awareness, capacity issues, and cultural norms inhibiting residents' involvement in CHT decision-making. Despite these obstacles, the community's deep attachment to the area's heritage, appreciation of tangible and intangible heritage, and recognition of communal benefits motivate participation.
Using the IAD-NAAS framework, the research unravels collective action dilemmas, emphasizing how individual actions in one context can impact actions in adjacent contexts. Key action situations are monument conservation, local community livelihood development, tourism development, and community decision-making participation.
Through in-depth interviews, the study garners a rich understanding of barriers and motivations for community participation. It highlights the role of community involvement in creating inclusive, diverse heritage narratives, challenging the conventional discourses dominating heritage narratives. Thus, fostering a democratic and inclusive approach to heritage.
Intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams (IRES) experience drying events, and they are becoming increasingly common due to climate change and anthropogenic water withdrawal. Despite their prevalence, IRES have been less studied than non-drying rivers, and more research is needed to understand their dynamics. This dissertation examines drying events' effects on the sediment microbial community structure and biogeochemistry in temperate IRES. First, a research study was carried out using an outdoor mesocosm setup to track changes in bacterial and fungal communities, microbial functions and properties of sediment-dissolved organic carbon during three different drying events. Results showed that drying duration and intensity and sediment organic matter content regulated river Spree sediment microbial community composition and biogeochemical processes during drying. The associated sediment respiration, assessed as CO2 flux, rapidly declined during all drying treatments, and Bacilli class became the most dominant bacteria after 90 days of drying, except in non-enriched sediment under the most intense drying. Second, a microcosm experiment was conducted to understand how sediment drying history and properties influence biogeochemical dynamics during an IRES expansion phase. Sediment respiration and nutrient release/retention rates were measured through flow resumption, and results showed that drying duration and intensity and sediment organic matter content regulated the dynamics of nutrients and respiration upon flow resumption. Under the most intense and prolonged drying, non-enriched sediment showed a lag response in respiration during the first day after flow resumption, while all other treatments had either a linear increase or a fast pulse in respiration. Finally, the long-term microbial succession in IRES sediment and soil in the experimental catchment of Chicken Creek was investigated. In 2008 and 2018, the sediment of three ephemeral streams and their adjacent soil was analyzed for the structure of the bacterial and fungal communities and microbial functions across different seasons. Results showed that environmental factors, such as vegetation type and organic matter content, mediated sediment and soil microbial succession in Chicken Creek. Ephemeral streams under spare and sporadic flow events remained unique ecosystems with distinctive microbial communities and biogeochemical dynamics, different from its riparian soil. Overall, this dissertation concludes that temperate IRES are dynamic ecosystems where dry-wet cycles and environmental factors modulate their sediment microbial community structure and function trajectories in the short- and long term.
The Taylor-Couette (TC) flow, the flow confined between two concentric independently rotating cylinders, is used as a perfect model to investigate shear flow over concave surfaces and one of the paradigmatic systems of the physics of fluids. In this thesis, an experimental investigation of the turbulent TC flow in a very wide gap geometry with a radius ratio 𝜂 = 0.1 is performed. The physical and dynamic behavior of the flow is studied in a geometry that has rarely been investigated before the current study, which makes this study unique. The study aims to understand the effect of curvature on the TC flow, particularly in cases where the circumferential length of the inner cylinder is smaller than the gap width. The flow is studied in the different rotation regimes: counter-rotating, co-rotating, and purely inner cylinder rotating regimes up to shear Reynolds numbers Re_s≤ 150000. The flow field has been qualitatively studied using visualization techniques. By probing the different flow parameters, familiar coherent TC flow patterns appear, in addition to newly observed patterns we assume only exist for very wide gap TC flows. For a more detailed quantitative study, a time-resolved velocity field measurement has been conducted using the High-speed Particle Image Velocimetry technique through the system end plate. The radial and azimuthal velocity components in the 2D horizontal plane are measured at different axial positions, in order to scan the axial variance of the flow. The recorded flow field is used to compute the angular momentum transport in terms of the quasi-Nusselt number (Nu_ω). The results show a maximum of Nu_ω for low counter-rotating rates of −0.011 ≤ μ_max ≤ −0.0077, which is associated with large-scale structures that span the entire gap. Moreover, the Nu_ω decreases for counter-rotation rates higher than μ_max until it reaches a minimum value and then tends to increase again for higher counter-rotation cases. The space-time behavior of the turbulent flow field for the high counter-rotating cases shows the existence of newly observed patterns next to the outer cylinder wall that propagates inward, enhancing the angular momentum transport and resulting in a second maximum in transport for higher counter-rotating rates. For the pure rotating inner cylinder, the momentum transport scaling with the shear rate Nu_ω ∼ Re_s^α has been studied, and it shows a transition in scaling to 𝛼 = −0.76 for all flows with Re_(s )≥ 25000. This new scaling reveals the transition of the flow from the classical turbulent regime to the ultimate one, where this transition is accompanied by a clear change in the flow behavior. Moreover, the flow in the co-rotating regime and particularly in the centrifugal stable regime (𝜇 > +0.01) is investigated. The Velocity measurements show the presence of disturbed flow near the inner cylinder, where the measured velocity profiles showed a clear deviation from those predicted by laminar flow for flows up to 𝜇 = +0.04.
Stochastic optimal control problems of residential heating systems with a geothermal energy storage
(2023)
In this thesis we consider a residential heating system equipped with several heat production and consumption units and investigate the stochastic optimal control problem for its cost-optimal management. As a special feature the manager has access to a geothermal storage (GS) which allows for inter-temporal transfer of heat energy by storing leftover solar thermal energy generated in summer for satisfying demand later. It is charged and discharged via heat exchanger pipes filled with a moving fluid. Further, the manager of that system faces uncertainties about the future fuel price and heat demand. The main goal is to minimize the expected aggregated cost for generating heat and running the system. This leads to a challenging mathematical optimization problem. The problem is formulated first as a non-standard continuous-time stochastic optimal control problem for a controlled state process whose dynamics is described by a system of ordinary differential equations (ODEs), stochastic differential equations and a partial differential equation (PDE). The PDE, which describes the temperature distribution in the GS, is first converted into a high-dimensional system of ODEs by semi-discretizing the space variables and its stability is investigated. This makes it possible to compute some aggregated characteristics which are useful for the operation of the GS embedded in the residential heating system. Second, the linear time-varying system of ODEs is approximated by a suitable linear time-invariant system. This allows the Lyapunov balanced truncation model order reduction method to be applied. Finally, we investigate the solution of the resulting standard optimal control problem for a controlled multi-dimensional diffusion process using dynamic programming methods and derive the corresponding Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation. However, no analytical solution of the HJB equation can be expected for the control problem under investigation. Therefore, we transform the continuous-time optimal control problem into a discrete-time control problem for a controlled Markov chain with finitely many states by discretizing both the time and the states. After determining the transition probabilities, the problem is solved using methods from the theory of Markovian decision processes. The thesis presents results of extensive numerical experiments carried out with the developed methods which reveal typical properties of the value function and the optimal strategy of the optimization problem. We end this thesis by describing some alternative methods to overcome the curse of dimensionality.
Ungauged and data-scarce coastal river catchments, small and medium-sized ones in particular, are popular worldwide, especially in developing countries in Southeast Asia. In general, coastal river catchments are exposed to various coastal hazards such as fluvial floods, typhoons, and sea-level rise. In addition, climate change and socio-economic development will substantially change global flood risks. However, in scientific research, flood risk and future flood risk assessments in such coastal river catchments have not been significantly considered. Therefore, the overall objective of this thesis is to propose an innovative methodological framework for modeling and evaluating flood risk in such river catchments in the future under the impacts of climate change, sea-level rise, and land-use change based on using numerical models (hydrological models and land-use change models) and remote sensing data (satellite images and precipitation) in combination with other state-of-the-art methods, tools and models, and new approaches, such as flood risk assessment methods, regionalization methods, and statistical downscaling methods. The proposed framework was adopted, applied, and validated successfully for a case study - Tra Bong River Catchment - on the south-central coast of Vietnam as a test application. The main conclusion of this research is that the proposed framework can provide valuable information and projections of changing future flood risk associated with climatic and socio-economic changes in ungauged and data-scarce coastal river catchments. The proposed framework is designed with free model and method choices, meaning that it can apply different methods and tools for each step depending on the natural characteristics of river catchments, data collection, tools, and understanding of models, etc. Finally, this research can be used as a technical reference for designing and building national, regional, or local frameworks/guidelines for assessing future flood risk in ungauged and data-scarce coastal river catchments in Vietnam and other countries in Southeast Asia.
Precession driven flows are believed to play a relevant role in planetary dynamics, such as in atmospheric phenomena, and as a complementary energy source for homogeneous dynamo action, i.e. the self-generation of planetary magnetic fields. Precessional motion occurs when a body rotates around an axis, which itself is rotating around another axis. The main influence of this forcing mechanism is a gyroscopic effect on the fluid flow which gives rise to a wavy dynamics even in the laminar regime. If the forcing magnitude is strong enough the flow goes through a series of phenomena such as instabilities, resonant interactions between waves, and transition to turbulence whose occurrence depends on the container shape and the angle between the two axis. Although many phenomena have a satisfactory explanation, others still remain elusive and merit further investigations.
The interest in moderate to large forcing is particularly motivated by the need of theoretical supports for the upcoming DRESDYN (DREsden Sodium facility for DYNnamo and thermohydraulic studies) precession experiment, whose main purpose is to test the capability of a precessing fluid system to achieve a dynamo effect. Here, the possibility to generate a magnetic field is connected to the emergence of three large scale structures in the bulk flow: a directly forced standing wave, poloidal vortices, and a geostrophic axisymmetric flow.
In this thesis we use numerical simulations to study and understand the flow behavior in a fluid-filled precessing cylinder. We use two types of approaches: a global study to investigate large scale phenomena and the resulting magnetohydrodynamics behavior, and a local model to analyze and unveil the properties of turbulence forced by precession. The bulk flow behavior present different responses with respect to the sense of motion: while prograde precession shows a steep transition to turbulence when increasing the forcing magnitude with a marked breakdown of the directly forced mode, retrograde precession presents a much smoother change. A related distinction has been found also for the dynamo action, which is more likely to occur for perpendicular and retrograde precession. The precession driven turbulence is a complex scenario determined by the coexistence of geostrophic vortices (called also condensates), a typical feature of rotating turbulence prone to an inverse cascade of energy, and small scale 3D waves characterized by a direct energy cascade. We observe the interaction of these two structures as being governed by a clear hierarchy.
The accelerated urbanization has led to increasing tension on urban land use. In this context, more and more slender high-rise buildings are being built worldwide in pursuit of better economic benefits. However, these structures are susceptible to wind excitation due to their lower first natural frequency. Different passive, semi-active, and active damping systems have been developed to reduce wind-induced structural vibration. Among them, the tuned mass dampers are widely used and proved as a very effective method in practice. However, this system requires a large additional damping mass. This also causes additional reinforcement, which increases the cost and carbon footprint. A huge space near the top story of the building is needed for the installation. In this research, a novel system named distributed-Multiple Tuned Facade Damping (d-MTFD) system is proposed by using specially designed parallel moveable Double-Skin Facade (DSF) outer skin as damping mass. These moveable facade elements can be installed on the upper stories of the high-rise building. Smooth-running guide rail systems are used to achieve the parallel moveability. Multi-objective optimization based on the Genetic Algorithm (GA) is applied to reduce the maximum top floor acceleration (Objective I) and to reduce the maximum facade relative displacement (Objective II) simultaneously. The optimization results for the passive and semi-active systems are presented in the form of the Pareto front. The trade-off between these selected two competing optimization objectives is observed. This approach was first validated in a simulation using a 306 m tall reference building for a wind speed of 13.5 m/s at 10 m above ground level with a return period of 10 years. Acceptable peak accelerations at the top story for hotel use and a maximum facade relative displacement of less than ±0.5 m could be achieved for the benchmark building with the d-MTFD system. For semi-active control, the variable damping coefficient can be achieved by using stepper motors in generator mode. The electrical damping coefficient can be continuously adjusted by the developed power electronics. In addition, electrical energy can be generated and stored in a battery. A full-scale prototype with one parallel moveable facade element was built. Based on the prototype, the functionality of the semi-active control using a stepper motor and its energy harvesting performance was tested by applying Hardware-in-the-Loop (HiL) simulations. Greybox system identification was used to estimate some parameters (spring stiffness, friction, etc.) in the connection. The accurate system identification results ensure further validation using HiL simulations. The HiL simulations successfully demonstrated the feasibility of a self-powered semi-active d-MTFD system.
The incompressible temporally developing turbulent boundary layer (TBL) and spatially developing turbulent boundary layer (SBL) with and without blowing is analyzed using the map-based stochastic one-dimensional turbulence (ODT) model. An understanding of these idealized flows is of fundamental relevance for boundary layer-type problems, which are frequently encountered in several applications, from atmospheric sciences to engineering. In the ODT model, the flow variables are resolved on all scales along a wall-normal, 1-D domain. These variables are evolved by a deterministic process representing molecular diffusion and by a stochastic process modeling the effect of turbulent advection and pressure fluctuations. Due to the reduction in dimensionality, the model is particularly appropriate for high Reynolds number flow. It is shown that the ODT model is able to capture salient features of the turbulent boundary layer-type flows by comparing the results with various available reference direct numerical simulation (DNS), large eddy simulation (LES) and experimental results. The comparison is presented for the mean velocity profiles, turbulent velocity fluctuation profiles (up to fourth order), the skin friction coefficient and shape factor for different bulk (Reb) and momentum Reynolds numbers (Reθ) using fixed model parameters. The influence of the model parameters is also discussed for various momentum Reynolds numbers for each investigated flow configuration. The results discussed in this thesis suggest that the ODT model is an economical and reasonably accurate approach for the simulation of turbulent boundary layer flows.
A demonstrator plant of a recently patented process for improved sludge degradation has been implemented on a municipal scale. In a 1500 m3 sewage sludge digester, an intermediary stage with aerobic sewage sludge reactivation was implemented. This oxic activation increased the biogas yield by up to 55% with a 25% reduction of the remaining fermentation residue volume. Furthermore, this process allowed an NH4-N removal of over 90%. Additionally, 16S rRNA gene amplicon high-throughput sequencing of the reactivated digestate showed a reduced number of methane-forming archaea compared to the main digester. Multiple ammonium-oxidizing bacteria were detected. This includes multiple genera belonging to the family Chitinophagaceae (the highest values reached 18.8% of the DNA sequences) as well as a small amount of the genus Candidatus nitrosoglobus (<0.3%). In summary, the process described here provides an economically viable method to eliminate nitrogen from sewage sludge while achieving higher biogas yields and fewer potential pathogens in the residuals.
In this study, heat-treated and multisurface engineered DIN 1.2367 tool steel was subjected to room and elevated temperature wear tests, and the effect of nitriding on its tribological behavior was investigated. CrN, AlTiN, and CrN/AlTiN coatings with a total thickness of 2 µm were obtained by arc cathodic physical vapor deposition on conventional heat-treated and gas-nitrided steels. The white layer formed during nitriding was removed, and a diffusion layer (100 µm) was achieved in the cross section of the steel having a tempered martensitic matrix. The highest surface hardness was attained with an integral coating (CrN/AlTiN), and surface hardness increased even more after nitriding due to the formation of a multicomponent ceramic layer on top of the diffusion layer. The room temperature wear tests performed against an alumina counterpart revealed that (i) CrN/AlTiN-coated steel had the highest friction coefficient of 0.26, which further increased to 0.33 by nitriding due to the increase in shear strength, and that (ii) with increasing surface hardness, the specific wear rates (W) of the heat-treated and coated steels could be ranked as follows: WCrN/AlTiN < WAlTiN < WCrN. The wear rates decreased when nitriding was carried out prior to coating. In order to simulate the aluminum extrusion conditions, hot wear behavior of the surfaces against AA6080 alloy at 450 °C was investigated. The hot wear tests revealed that (i) high friction coefficients were reached due to the adhesive characteristic of aluminum to the surfaces, (ii) the nitrided and CrN/AlTiN-coated sample exhibited the lowest wear rate among all studied surfaces, and (iii) the film damage on the worn surfaces mostly occurred in the form of droplet delamination.
Additive Manufacturing of metals has become relevant for industrial applications. The near net-shape production of components produced by Laser Powder Bed Fusion (PBF-LB/M) enables new possibilities in component design combined with a reduction of the amount of needed material. Omitting the extra material, that was part of conventionally produced components due to machining constraints, results in components which in consequence lack the inherent additional safety margins provided by the higher material consumption of conventionally produced components. Therefore, to use PBF-LB/M metals in safety critical applications an in-depth understanding of porosity and internal stresses in parts made by PBF-LB/M is needed. Only non-destructive testing methods—such as computed tomography and residual stress analysis using neutrons—enable the assessment of porosity and stresses in the whole part. In this thesis I tackled creep and tensile static deformed specimens to fill research gaps in this field in terms of analysing PBF-LB/M stainless steel AISI 316L: from structural properties to in-situ behaviour. The initial void population of AISI 316L is studied using X-ray and synchrotron micro computed tomography. Specimens produced with different process parameters were analysed to quantify the influence of process parameters on the initial void population. The possibility to close voids using the laser illumination of subsequent layers is discussed by a quantitative study of the ability of the laser to melt different multiples of the applied layer thickness. The formation of internal stress is inherent to components produced by the PBFLB/ M process. These stresses remain in the components after production as residual stresses. In this thesis a study is presented which aims to unravel the mechanisms that define the spatial distribution of the residual stresses, and their magnitude. In the end, the population of internal voids during mechanical testing is studied by X-ray micro computed tomography. The evolution of damage accumulation in creep specimens is studied at different stages of the creep test. Results are compared to a creep tested conventionally made specimen and to a PBF-LB/M specimen from a tensile test. An interconnection between the PBF-LB/M microstructure and the pattern of damage is revealed.
Violent chronic conflicts, uprooting, and the continuous massive (re)generation of displacement waves constitute the main elements of the Kurds’ history within nation-states’ (changing) geographies. Today, Kurdish-inhabited territories represent palimpsests of involuntary dislocations and relocation stories, constantly (re)written by refuge-seeking/ granting (spatial) practices. Since 2011, contemporary uprisings and wars in Syria and Iraq have inscribed the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KR-I) territories with a new layer of displacement stories. These territories acted as frontline receptors for consecutive Syrian refugees and Iraqi internally displaced waves seeking protection. Displacees found refuge in the rural, urban and newly set humanitarian camps’ spaces; hence, they (temporarily) anchored and carved some sort of a presence within their receiving sites. The rationale behind such receiving sites' emergence, use and progression in the KR-I have historically oscillated between modernization, discipline, development and humanitarianism.
Guided by the urbanism lens, this research aims to narrate the KR-I’s forced displacement territorial biography of involuntary dislocated and (re)located Kurds. This narration chronologically traces these groups' newly (re)shaped receiving sites and how refuge-seeking/granting practices aggregated and (re) articulated the KR-I’s territories. It investigates the ways in which these receiving sites act as seeds of emerging urbanities in such a politically contested region. On the one hand, the research zooms out and repositions these sites' emergence and spatial progression within a broader geopolitical context, socioeconomic conditionalities, uses and meaning subversions due to the ever-changing actors. On the other hand, it zooms closely into the newly set Syrian-Kurdish refugee camps in the KR-I within and beyond predefined (nation-state) belongings in their ever-distorted time-space frames. It securitizes on the ways in which these sites are conceived and inhabited to (re)claim rights “to” and “in” space, territory, history and future. Between the large and small pictures, the research investigates the human and the non-human spatial agency that (re)patches these ruptured Kurds' collective memories and contemporary narratives of where, when, what and with whom (a future) home rests.
This study is an urgent call for the international and local constellation of actors to critically rethink their standardized ready-made solutions and piece-meal spatial interventions in geographies associated with chronic crisis, ever (re)branded under emergency, development and peace ‘help’ banners. It sets the basis for rearticulating and developing further research-based interventions that account for exhausted conflict-ridden (infra)structures, political sensitivities, socio-economic situations and environmental impacts.
In this work we investigated the resistance of different kP implementations based on the Montgomery ladder against horizontal, i.e. single trace, attacks. Applying statistical methods for the analysis we were able to reveal the secret value k completely. The reason causing the success of our attacks is the key-dependent addressing of the registers and other design blocks, which is an inherent feature of binary kP algorithms. This dependency was successfully exploited in the past by Itoh et al. analyzing many hundreds of kP traces, i.e. this attack is a vertical address-bit differential power analysis attack against Montgomery ladder. The vulnerability of the Montgomery ladder against horizontal address-bit attacks was detected and demonstrated during our investigations. We were able to reveal the scalar k exploiting the address-bit vulnerability in single trace attacks using not only statistical methods, but also Fourier transform, selected clustering methods as well as one of the simplest methods – the automatized simple SCA. We performed successful horizontal address-bit SCA attacks against both types of ECs, i.e. against highly regular Montgomery ladder and against a binary kP algorithm implementing atomic patterns. The success of our attacks shows that the regularity and atomicity principles are not effective against horizontal address-bit attacks. As a means for reducing the attack success, we investigated the hiding ability of the field multiplier which is usually the largest block of kP designs. We implemented our field multiplier for ECs over prime fields corresponding to the 4-segment Karatsuba multiplication formula that reduces the execution time and the energy consumption for a kP operation by about 40 % in comparison to multipliers exploiting the classical multiplication formula. However, the energy consumption per clock remained in our multiplier without significant changes, i.e. the protective hiding properties of the multiplier as a noise source were not decreased. Another advantage of our field multiplier is its inherent resistance to horizontal collision attacks, in contrast to multipliers based on the classic multiplication formula. Additionally, we proposed regular scheduling for the block addressing as an effective strategy for reducing the success of horizontal address-bit attacks. Combining this approach with the hiding features of the field multipliers can increase the resistance of the kP designs for both types of ECs against a broad spectrum of SCA attacks. The mentioned analysis methods can be successfully applied for determining SCA leakage sources in the early design phase.
Nanopore sequencing, a third-generation sequencing technique that applies nanometre sized pores to transduce the physical and chemical properties of specific nucleobases into measurable electrical signals, shows attractive advantages over conventional next-generation sequencing techniques. However, primarily due to high sequencing error rates this technique has rarely been used so far in clinical laboratory diagnostics. In this cumulative dissertation Nanopore sequencing was established and validated in clinical diagnostics using the example of the molecular diagnosis of Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) and SARS coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infections. First, a novel data analysis pipeline for accurate single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotyping using Nanopore sequencing data was developed and validated with the corresponding sequencing protocol against conventional Sanger sequencing using 47 samples of patients with clinical suspicion of FMF. This method comparison showed a perfect agreement between both methods rendering current Nanopore sequencing in principle suitable for SNP genotyping in human genetics.
The bioinformatic analysis of sequencing data is one of the most challenging parts in Nanopore sequencing experiments and complicates the application in a clinical diagnostic setting. Therefore, six different bioinformatic tools for sequence alignment were evaluated regarding their applicability to Nanopore sequencing data. This evaluation revealed a good suitability of all except one of these tools although differences in quality and performance exist.
Since Nanopore sequencing showed a robust performance in SNP genotyping, a SARS-CoV-2 whole genome sequencing (WGS) protocol was established to enable onside viral WGS in a clinical laboratory. This was especially important for viral molecular biological surveillance during the pandemic as shown by analysing viral genetic data over the course of one year. Applying this approach in a clinical research project to investigate host-virus interaction by aggregating for the first time viral genetic data, serological data and clinical data, showed diverse humoral immune responses to SARS-CoV-2, that appear to be influenced by age, obesity and disease severity. Further, even small viral genetic changes may influence the clinical presentation of the associated disease COVID-19. Additionally, a novel reverse transcriptase (RT)- loop mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) assay for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 was developed and validated for diagnostic use by method comparison with conventional RT-polymerase chain reaction (PCR). In summary, by presenting advancements of sequencing and bioinformatic workflows with the focus on an application in clinical diagnostics, the results of this thesis may pave the way for a broader application of Nanopore sequencing in laboratory medicine in the near future.
Between 2000 and 2015, the services sector grew by 23% in OECD countries, with around two-thirds of the working population employed in this sector. In the European Union, 72.1% of the labor force worked in the services sector in 2018. With a growing global population, the demand for services is also increasing, making increasing service productivity an important research goal.
Public and private service companies are subject to different incentive structures that influence their approach to productivity. Public service enterprises, especially in the social, health, and education sectors, play a critical role in society. Improving public service productivity is therefore essential.
Two research questions are addressed: What factors have the greatest impact on the performance of service workers? How can performance improvement be expressed by managing the influencing factors of frontline employees? By focusing on frontline employees, this dissertation recognizes their essential role in increasing service productivity. The goal of the thesis is to gain insight into the factors that influence their productivity in public service.
The dissertation reviews service productivity models in detail. Differences and connections between the various models and schools of models are discussed. Grönroos and Ojasalo's model of service productivity is selected as the theoretical framework for the empirical study to examine the factors influencing frontline employees. The systematic selection of influencing factors as well as the evaluation of previous research on these factors, reveals research gaps, which are translated into hypotheses. The majority of the data for the empirical part comes from public service companies. The designed questionnaire serves as a starting point for the development of a scale for empirical validation for one part, a component of the Grönroos-Ojasalo model. The research results offer a basis for action for practitioners who want to achieve productivity improvements.
Solving differential equations is still a topic of major interest, due to their appearance in many fields of science and engineering and a classic approach with neural networks builds upon trial solutions, the so-called neural forms. The latter are incorporated in a cost function that is subject to minimisation, to train the involved neural networks. Neural forms represent general and flexible tools for solving ordinary differential equations, partial differential equations as well as systems of each. However, the computational approach is in general highly dependent on a variety of computational parameters and the choice of the optimisation methods. Studying the solution of a simple but fundamental stiff ordinary differential equations with small feedforward neural networks and first order optimisation shows, that it is possible to identify preferable choices for parameters and methods. The neural network weight initialisation appears to be a sensitive topic, while having a major impact on the solution accuracy. Especially the use of non-random (deterministic) weights partially shows poor performance, but removes a stochastic component. Further research reveals, that a new polynomial representation of the neural forms can significantly increase the reliability of a deterministic initialisation (all weights have initially the same values assigned). In order to maintain smaller neural network architectures and solve the differential equation, even on fairly large domains, a new technique called domain segmentation (for initial value problems) is introduced. The solution domain splits into equidistant subdomains and the above-mentioned collocation polynomial neural forms are solved separately in each domain fragment. At the boundary of any subdomain, a new initial value is provided by the neural forms solution and directly incorporated in the adjacent one. In classic adaptive numerical methods for solving differential equations, the mesh as well as the domain may be refined or decomposed, respectively, in order to improve numerical accuracy. The subdomain distribution can also be connected with an adaptive refinement. That is, the neural network training status is combined with an adaptive subdomain size reduction in the new adaptive neural domain refinement algorithm. That is, each subdomain is reduced in size until the optimisation is resolved up to a predefined training accuracy. In addition, while the neural networks are by default small, the number of neurons may also be adjusted in an adaptive way. Conditions are introduced to automatically confirm the solution reliability and optimise computational parameters whenever it is necessary.
Nowadays day-to-day digital communication and social life has only fortified with the ongoing pandemic. People enjoy communication and information across various (direct) messaging platforms and accepted its ever-increasing impact on public discourse and society. While traditional platforms implement user profiles enabling social credit, the landscape also includes anonymity. Yet, a new type of application combining anonymity with a strong spatial focus, hyperlocality, emerged over recent years. To this point, platform implications of both uniquely combined design properties largely remain unknown.
In this thesis, we provide a first data-driven holistic view on Jodel that combines both properties. We leverage unbiased complete ground truth information to dissect a plethora of communities across two different countries: Germany and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This work follows a platform perspective identifying four major essentially important areas revolving around the individual.
That is, we begin with a broad analysis of three User Adoption processes along three different applications. After discussing our measurements of the user base adoption of the German COVID-19 digital contact tracing application, we provide evidence of well-established platforms being re-purposed as a side channel to evade censorship in the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian hybrid war. We further showcase that the very same platform ingredients may yield vastly different outcomes on the messaging app Jodel. While any online platform builds upon User Interactions, we structurally characterize Jodel behavior across both countries. We discuss structural disparities and detail platform implications - solely induced by local user behavior. An in-depth look into the Saudi community landscape closes a research gap to platform usage in a different society, identifying differences.
Further, we discuss User Content analyzing information diffusion. Taking content to the next level, we developed a multidimensional classification scheme for intents (why) and topics (what) of social media messages and provide details of a crowdsourced campaign for Saudi Arabian contents. With neural word embeddings as a tool for making text tangible and the prevalence of emoji in social media communication, we discuss quantitative and qualitative insights to word-emoji embeddings reflecting semantics. Additionally, we make such embeddings interpretable and provide evidence that our method is well in line with human judgement.
In terms of User Management, we detail insights to distributed moderation processes and model the threat of abusive content. In the long term, platforms need to establish a sustainable, preferably growing, environment. That is, we next discuss user lifetime and possibly early churn factors, while modeling user lifetime from metadata. We finish with a blueprint of data-driven long-term quality of experience analyzes in a controlled massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) environment.
Multi- and manycore processors promise to combine high overall peak performance with moderate power consumption to meet the constantly growing demand for computational power under the energy constraints of today’s CMOS technology. Future systems with manycore processors are expected to contain a huge amount of cores, which exceeds the number of processes that will run simultaneously. Consequently, processor time sharing approaches, that introduce significant overhead from regular context switches in common OS, will no longer be necessary.
This work investigates mechanisms for scalable and energy-efficient spatial partitioning of multi- and manycore processor systems. In addition, it explores the implications of exclusive processor core allocation to user processes due to the absence of temporal multiplexing and offers approaches to ease the adaptation to the new programming model.
The proposed mechanisms achieved fast thread allocation which motivates applications for dynamic thread allocation and benefits performance as well as energy efficiency. The efficiency control and resource revocation mechanisms detect and prevent wasteful and inefficient resource occupation from poorly optimized or malicious processes. In this way, the global efficiency of the system is optimized. The dynamic processing resource allocation and revocation handling has been integrated into a task parallel runtime system, to disburden the application programmer from manual implementation and to increase productivity.
For the third time we were able to hold our PhD workshop "Research is Calling" on smart medical devices and systems, this time in Berlin again. This unique workshop brings together young scientists from computer science and medicine to provide a forum to discuss the very latest approaches to smart medical devices and systems. This year, for the first time, it is possible to publish corresponding workshop proceedings via the publication service of the Brandenburg Technical University (BTU). In our view, this format can create true interdisciplinarity because everyone presents their ideas and interim results to colleagues from a wide variety of disciplines and, conversely, hears and sees the latest from many other specialties. This forum is the vehicle for initiating new collaborations and planning joint research projects. The 'Cottbus project' emerged from personal partnerships between 'technicians' and 'physicians' and was planned from the beginning as a platform and an offer: as a platform for free and fully open scientific exchange and discourse, as an offer to all who are interested, also and gladly beyond Brandenburg. Begun as a "PhD Colloquium", Cottbus' "Research is Calling" is an ideas laboratory for young scientists. Cottbus is to establish a university medical faculty in the next few years as part of the structural change program following the coal phase-out. From our point of view, this lab is an important building block to establish cross-sectional issues right at the interface between medicine and technology, a culture of open discourse and scientific dialogue. The workshop covers the following topics in particular: Smart sensors for medical applications, Low-power wearable sensors, artificial intelligence for medical applications, medical robots, algorithms for medical applications, applications and case studies. Despite the pandemic situation the workshop could be held in presence. In five exciting presentations new ideas and cooperation possibilities were shown. Two keynotes (including Alina Nechyporenko, Marcus Frohme as special guests) and a dinner rounded off the program. At this point we would like to thank all participants, the reviewers, and the organizers, Stefan Scharoba and Kathleen Galke. We look forward to establishing this event as permanent and reaching an ever-growing audience.
Temperature variability may have direct and indirect impacts on the environments of the Accra and Kumasi Metropolises in Ghana. This study analysed temperature and trends in temperature in both cities using in-situ measurements from one meteorological station in both cities from 1986 to 2015. The temperature indices were computed using the RClimdex package from the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection Monitoring Indices (ETCCDMI). The temperature time series was pre-whitened before the Mann–Kendall trend and Sen’s slope estimator analysis were applied. Initial analysis revealed minimal variation in temperature in both cities. The results from the analysed temperature indices revealed an increase in warm days and a general rise in the minimum temperature compared to maximum temperatures. Mann Kendall and Sen’s slope revealed significant trends in the annual and seasonal (dry and wet seasons) in minimum temperature in both cities. These might lead to an increased rate of heat-stressed diseases and an overall rise in urban warming in both cities. The analysis of temperature, indices and trends provided comprehensive insights into the temperature of Accra and Kumasi. The results highlight the essence of evaluating temperature indices and trends in light of Climate Change concerns. It is recommended that urban green and blue spaces should be incorporated into land use plans as these policy directions can aid regulate the temperature in both cities.
Vertex and edge orderings of graphs are commonly used in algorithmic graph theory. Such orderings can encode structural properties of graphs in a condensed way and, thus, they can be used to process a graph efficiently. A common approach to find particular vertex orderings are graph searches. Here, we study the complexity of deciding whether vertex orderings with special properties can be found by particular graph searches. The properties of these orderings concern their end-vertices, their search trees or constraints encoded by partial orders.
Many graph classes can be characterized via special vertex orderings. We introduce another example, the semi-proper interval graphs, generalizations of connected proper interval graphs that are characterized via special variants of perfect elimination orderings. We study the structure of these graphs, present a linear-time recognition algorithm and show that they share some strong properties on Hamiltonian paths and cycles with proper interval graphs.
We also generalize the notion of graph classes to the case of edge-weighted graphs. A weighted graph is a member of such a weighted class if subgraphs containing edges of particular weights are members of the respective unweighted graph class. We present conditions on an unweighted graph class that ensure a linear-time recognition algorithm for its corresponding weighted graph class. This conditions make use of a novel edge monotonicity and of particular edge orderings. We apply this result to three well-known graph classes, namely split graphs, threshold graphs, and chain graphs.
Finally, we consider dynamic algorithms on threshold and chain graphs. These algorithms update certain properties of a graph after small modifications are applied to its vertex or edge set. We present certifying dynamic recognition algorithms of these classes, i.e., if the graph leaves the class after the modification, we can prove this by providing a forbidden induced subgraph of bounded size. Building on these results, we extend the notion of dynamic recognition algorithms to whole sets of edges and vertices. Furthermore, we present dynamic algorithms for the Hamiltonian path and cycle problems.
Neuroadaptive technology (NAT) utilizes real-time measures of neurophysiological activity within a closed control loop to create intelligent software adaptation. Measures of electrocortical and neurovascular brain activity are quantified to provide a dynamic representation of the psychological state of the user, with respect to cognitions, emotions and motivation. As such, NAT can access unique aspects of human information processing, and human intelligence, which can subsequently be used to enable more versatile and more human-like forms of machine intelligence. Current trends in different scientific fields indicate an increased interest in integrating context-sensitive information from the human brain into Artificial Intelligence. NAT'22, the Neuroadaptive Technology Conference 2022, was intended to bring scientists interested in Physiological Computing, Applied Neurosciences and Passive Brain-Computer Interfaces together with experts from the fields of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Intelligent Systems. The main goals of the conference were an exchange of research questions and findings from these fields and the identification of common goals and joint ventures in the domain of Neuroadaptive Technology, including: real-time signal processing, unsupervised vs. supervised ML, designing neuroadaptive interaction, explainable AI (XAI), neuroadaptive applications, hybrid AI systems (DL + symbolic AI) for applied neurosciences, ethics of neurotechnology in real world (responsibility for action, security), cloud-based solutions for data management and more.
NAT'22 was held in Lübbenau, near Berlin, and organised by the Society for Neuroadaptive Technology. These Proceedings contain the abstracts of six keynote lectures and a total of 39 submissions in the categories of Brain-Computer Interface & Applications, Ethics & Perspectives, Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning, and a poster session.
Approaches to restore post-mining areas should provide sustainable solutions for recovering biodiversity and ecosystem services in regions experiencing massive deforestation. Key components that are impacted by surface mining activities and that restoration intervention should therefore target are biodiversity attributes and ecosystem service provisioning. The consequences of restoration decisions in post-mining areas in the Afrotropical region (here Ghana) remain understudied. To this end, l assessed levels of soil properties, biodiversity and ecosystem service in a post-mining area after two decades of active forest restoration by comparing them to attributes of the surrounding dominant land-use types. l hypothesized that (i) the interventions applied to restore and manage a post-mining area improve ecosystem attributes beyond conditions observed in the alternative dominant land-use types and even reaching levels comparable to reference forest (Chapter III), (ii) soil conditions and the functional structure of tree communities drive ecosystem functions and multifunctionality, with highest multifunctionality levels in the restored and natural forests (Chapter IV), (iii) the structure of tree communities coupled with pronounced climatic seasonality support a higher number of arthropods and arthropod functional groups particularly in the wet season and in structurally heterogeneous land-use types (Chapter V), and (iv) active forest restoration enhances the levels of ecosystem service provision similar to the reference forest with possible trade-offs or synergies among individual ecosystem services across forest types (Chapter VI). Chapter I provides an introduction to deforestation, and further highlights global and national initiatives, including active forest restoration, to reverse or minimize the impacts of tropical deforestation. Chapter II details the methodological approaches applied for sampling. Chapter III focussed on soil properties in addition to below and above-ground biomass of trees. The characteristic soil attributes for the restored forest were not significantly different from those in the reference forest, except for bulk density and base saturation, but differed significantly from attributes in all other land-use types. Chapter IV focussed on how the functional structure of tree communities affects the provision of ecosystem services. For functional composition, both the leaf economic spectrum and the seed mass dimensions separated different land-use types. Chapter V addresses the research question on how post-mining restoration affects arthropod communities. Communities of ground-active arthropods differed significantly between land-use types depending on the season. By quantifying the various ecosystem attributes in the field and transforming them into ecosystem service proxies, l could primarily identify synergies with no apparent trade-off between ecosystem services across the forest land-use types (Chapter VI).
Cloud computing is an essential part of the digital transformation journey. It offers many benefits to organisations, including the advantages of scalability and agility. Cloud customers see cloud computing as a moving train that every organisation needs to catch. This means that adoption decisions are made quickly in order to keep up with the new trend. Such quick decisions have led to many disappointments for cloud customers and have questioned the cost of the cloud. This is also because there is a lack of criteria or guidelines to help cloud customers get a complete picture of what is required of them before they go to the cloud. From another perspective, as new technologies force changes to the organizational structure and business processes, it is important to understand how cloud computing changes the IT and non-IT departments and how can this be translated into costs.
Accordingly, this research uses the total cost of ownership approach and transaction cost theory to develop a customer-centric model to estimate the cost of cloud computing. The Research methodology used the Design Science Research approach. Expert interviews were used to develop the model. The model was then validated using four case studies. The model, named Sunny, identifies many costs that need to be estimated, which will help to make the cloud-based digital transformation journey less cloudy. The costs include Meta Services, Continuous Contract management, Monitoring and ITSM Adjustment. From an academic perspective, this research highlights the management efforts required for cloud computing and how misleading the rapid provision potential of the cloud resources can be. From a business perspective, proper estimation of these costs would help customers make informed decisions and vendors make realistic promises.
In wire-arc additive manufacturing, a wire is molten by an electrical or laser arc and deposited droplet-by-droplet to construct the desired workpiece, given as a set of two-dimensional layers. The weld source can move freely over a substrate plate, processing each layer, but there is also the possibility of moving without welding. A primary reason for stress inside the material is the large thermal gradient caused by the weld source, resulting in lower product quality. Thus, it is desirable to control the temperature of the workpiece during the process. One way of its optimization is the trajectory of the weld source. We consider the problem of finding a trajectory of the moving weld source for a single layer of an arbitrary workpiece that maximizes the quality of the part and derive a novel mixed-integer PDE-constrained model, including the calculation of a detailed temperature distribution measuring the overall quality. The resulting optimization problem is linearized and solved using the state-of-the-art numerical solver IBM CPLEX. Its performance is examined by several computational studies.
Historically, Ge is one of the oldest materials in the semiconductor industry and its (001) surface has been the subject of extensive investigations by photoelectron spectroscopy. I am going to challenge the predominant attribution of a semi-conducting nature of the Ge(001) surface in this thesis. My investigations reveal the presence of a Ge(001) surface state above the Fermi-level, occupied at room temperature. Employing time- and temperature-dependent angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy, I will demonstrate that the presence of this surface state is evidence for the conducting nature of the surface at room temperature.
Sparked by the remarkable properties of the GeSn-alloy and a trend towards Ge-Sn-related multiquantum well fabrication, I investigate the surface electronic structure of Ge(001) after adsorption and incorporation of Sn. With an in-depth analysis of surface core-level shifts, I will extend the growth model of the Sn wetting layer formation by also detailing structural changes in the subsurface region. At the same time, the modifications of the electronic structure will be detailed, observing the removal of the Ge(001) surface states, the creation of a new, Sn-related surface state and the initial stages of the Schottky barrier formation.
β-Ga2O3 is a transparent semi-conducting oxide that has sparked a lot of interest over the last decade, because it offers an ultra-wide band gap and high break down voltage. However, due to its monoclinic crystal structure, device fabrication is rather challenging and researchers are already looking into alternative materials. One of these candidates is ϵ-Ga2O3 and this work presents a combined study by photoelectron spectroscopy and ab initio calculations of its electronic structure. (Hard) X-rays reveal the impact of photoelectron recoil and the absence of a band bending to the surface, while the dispersion of experimentally determined valence states compares favorably with the calculations based on hybrid density-functional theory.
Another alternative to β-Ga2O3 could be ZnGa2O4 and I will present an investigation on the electronic structure of its (100) surface. Due to the novelty of ZnGa2O4 single-crystals, I am first going to explore the preparation of a clean and well-ordered surface by standard in-situ sputtering and annealing. I will show that already low annealing temperatures induce Zn-deficiency, leading to non-stoichiometric surfaces, further exacerbated by sputtering. By changing the sputtering parameters and the annealing conditions, the preparation of a surface with sufficient quality for subsequent investigations will be demonstrated. The results by photoemission techniques compare favorably with the expectations from theory and allowing the first fundamental insights into the surface electronic structure.
In-situ study of crack propagation in patterned structures of microchips using X-ray microscopy
(2023)
The motivation of this thesis was to control crack steering into regions of engineered 3D-nanopatterned structures with high fracture toughness and to determine the local critical energy release rate for crack propagation in 3D-nanopatterned systems. On-chip copper interconnect structures of advanced microchips, insulated by organosilicate glasses, were chosen as an example system to study fracture on small scale, since this is a well-defined 3D- nanopatterned system and since a high mechanical robustness is requested for microchips. An experiment for in-situ high-resolution 3D imaging of the fracture behavior of 3D-nanopatterned structures and of the kinetics of microcrack propagation in solids was designed and applied, combining a miniaturized micromechanical test and high-resolution X-ray imaging. Particularly, a miniaturized piezo-driven double cantilever beam test set-up (micro- DCB) was integrated in a laboratory X-ray microscope, and nano X-ray computed tomography was applied for high-resolution 3D imaging of the microcrack evolution in the on-chip interconnect stack of microchips manufactured in the 14 nm technology node. The measured geometry of the microcrack at several loading steps during the micro-DCB test and the subsequent data analysis based on linear elastic fracture mechanics and the Euler-Bernoulli beam model were the basis for the development and application of a new methodology to determine the critical energy release rate for crack propagation in sub- 100 nm regions of a processed wafer quantitatively. It was experimentally proven that specially designed metallic guard ring structures at the rim of the microchips dissipate energy in such a way that the microcrack propagation is efficiently slowed down and eventually stopped, i.e. they are effective to prevent mechanical damage of microchips. It was demonstrated that it is possible to steer the microcrack in a controlled way by tuning the fracture mode mixity locally at the crack tip. The established concept for a controlled crack propagation provides the basis for further fundamental studies of the fracture behavior of nanoscale materials and structures. The results have significant effects for the understanding of fracture mechanics at small scales, e.g. in microchips, but also in other nanopatterned materials, e.g. in bio-inspired, hierarchically structured engineered materials. The experimental results gathered at realistic microelectronic products provide valuable information to control the crack path in on-chip interconnect stacks for design-for-reliability in semiconductor industry and to manufacture mechanically robust microchips in leading-edge technology nodes. The experimental study of controlled microcrack steering into regions with high fracture toughness provides knowledge for the design of guard ring structures in microchips to stop the propagation of microcracks, e.g. generated during the wafer dicing process.
Climate change is a major threat to biodiversity and ecologists have identified necessary adaptation strategies. However, little research has been conducted so far on the economics of climate adaptation for biodiversity conservation. Three challenges arise from an economic perspective: How to (1) assess the impact of climate change on the cost-effectiveness of conservation, (2) consider the increasing uncertainty, and (3) evaluate conservation policy instruments under climate change. Addressing these challenges provides a thus far largely unexplored perspective on the economics of biodiversity conservation. This perspective relies on novel methodologies and provides policy-relevant insights.
In this thesis, these challenges are addressed in eight articles. Chapter 2 presents a novel economic evaluation framework to assess policy instruments for climate adaptation. Specific criteria are developed, their relevance for different strategies is assessed and suitable instruments identified.
Chapters 3 and 4 have a methodological focus as two climate-ecological-economic (CEE) models are developed. Chapter 3 presents an applied model integrating detailed sub-models able to assess the cost-effective spatio-temporal allocation of conservation measures. In chapter 4, methods from operations research are developed further to identify optimal time series of reserve networks. In both chapters, cost-effective conservation plans are identified in case study applications.
In chapter 5, CEE modelling is applied to examine the role of uncertainties regarding future climatic conditions. It is found that a trade-off between expected performance and robustness emerges in the case study in the future.
In chapters 6 to 8, CEE modelling is used to assess policy instruments under climate change. Chapter 6 examines an agri-environment scheme: cost-effectiveness requires flexibility in adapting the timing of conservation measures due to species’ adaptations and changes in costs. Chapter 7 examines two versions of land purchase: a “no sale” policy which prohibits sales for ecological reasons and a “sale” policy to enhance spatial flexibility for adaptation. A new trade-off is identified: while “no sale” mainly increases habitat permanence of expanding habitat types, “sale” improves the outcome for increasingly threatened habitat types. Chapter 8 is novel in its comparative analysis of two policy instruments considering spatial and management flexibility in a case study. It is found that in the case study, conservation contracts are more cost-effective than land purchase, but that the relative suitability switches when the conservation agency is able to capture producer rents.
Finally, chapter 9 uses the results of chapters 3 and 5 to develop an innovative teaching tool for students to learn about cost-effective biodiversity conservation under climate change.
High Medieval chimneys, although often the focal point of contemporary representative buildings, are rarely a topic of construction history. More often they appear in art or architectural history where they are discussed regarding their style and ornamentation. It is however worthwhile to examine these important representative objects with the tools of the construction historian. In them, we can find important information regarding the contemporary craftsmanship and skills. Based on extensive firsthand examinations and building archaeology this paper aims to discuss the planning and building process of the highly complex cut-stone chimney system in the keep of Schönburg Castle (1201 CE) using new methods of reverse engineering.
In the Garu-Tempane area and Tamne River basin of north-eastern Ghana, granitic aquifers supply nearly 80% of annually abstracted groundwater. Rapid and diffuse recharge enters the fractured and weathered Tamnean Plutonic Suite aquifers mainly granitoid, which are the dominant rock types in the study area. However, a greater challenge to the water supply in the area is posed by global climatic changes and overexploitation due to population growth. The semi-arid nature of the area together with the factors mentioned earlier has caused water scarcity, particularly in the dry season and these have affected the livelihoods of the farmers who depend mostly on the groundwater for irrigation and domestic purposes. A promising way to balance water resources in the region is using engineering technology such as managed aquifer recharge (MAR). MAR augments water levels in water-scarce areas and represents a key tool in water supply management.
For this reason, a comprehensive hydrogeological characterization involving the hydrochemistry of the groundwater, groundwater recharge process and residence time using multi-environmental tracers, and a numerical groundwater flow model was developed.
Based on the hydrochemistry results, the water quality index showed that the groundwater is very suitable for drinking. However, about 10.5 % out of the 38 groundwater samples had elevated nitrate concentrations exceeding the permissible WHO drinking water limit. These are mainly agricultural areas, which might have influenced the elevated nitrate concentrations.
Groundwater age dating using sulphur hexafluoride (SF6) and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) was used to date shallow groundwater in Ghana for the first time. The results proved that the mean residence time of groundwater was around 30 years, an indication of young groundwater and rapid groundwater renewability. The findings also showed different groundwater ages implying diffused flow systems occurring in the fractured granitic aquifer.
Investigation of the groundwater recharge using stable isotopes of deuterium and oxygen-18 revealed that the main source of groundwater recharge is of meteoric origin. There were little or no contributions from the stream and ponds as they were subjected to evaporative fractionation during the dry season. The White Volta River samples and samples from two big rivers were depleted in heavy isotopes, which suggested a hydraulic connection between them and the groundwater.
The numerical groundwater flow model was used to assess the feasibility of MAR and determine the maximum recharge and abstraction rates. The results showed that the aquifer had enough storage to accommodate enough volumes of floodwater without causing groundwater mounding. This shows that MAR is feasible in augmenting the water levels in the area when irrigation and domestic withdrawals are regulated.
The conversion of many drugs into toxic or less toxic metabolites depends on the first-pass effect of the liver. Toxic metabolites are associated with drug-induced liver injury, often causing liver failure. Thus, therapies often have to be interrupted despite a promising drug effect.
The development of an improved drug metabolism model consisting of liver-derived CYP3A4-overexpressing cells and tumour cells should be used to study drugs in vitro for their efficacy on tumour cells considering the first-pass effect.
Two different co-culture system approaches were tested (transwell insert-based and liver cell supernatant transfer) with HepG2 CYP3A4 cells, originally derived from a tumor characterized by genetic instability, serving as an in vitro liver cell model for establishment. PANC-1 cells (pancreatic cancer) or MCF-7 cells (breast cancer) were used as prototypical tumour cell lines. For cell treatment, three PANC-1 or MCF-7 active drugs MG-132 (MG), Taxol (TX) and Tamoxifen (TAM), were used as these drugs are inactivated (MG and TX) or activated (TAM) by the liver first-pass effect. Three widely used cytotoxicity assays (XTT-, CellTiter-Glo™ 2.0-, and trypan blue exclusion assay) were used to determine acute cytotoxicity to both liver and tumour cells. For co-culture validation, HepG2 CYP3A4 cells were replaced by CYP3A4-overexpressing immortalized primary-like hepatocytes, the FH3 CYP3A4 cells, representing the human liver cell model more closely.
Finally, in a pilot project, primary colon carcinoma cells (pCC-cells) were tested along with HepG2 CYP3A4 and MG.
The use of co-cultures with HepG2 CYP3A4 showed, that first-pass metabolism of MG resulted in reduced cytostatic effects in PANC-1 cells. The TX-induced cytotoxic effect on PANC-1 and MCF-7 cell lines is only slightly attenuated by the first-pass effect. Activation of TAM with FH3 CYP3A4 liver cells in indirect co-culture with transwell inserts most efficiently enhanced the cytotoxic effect on MCF-7 cells. In contrast, the use of HepG2 CYP3A4 proved to be insufficient.
PCC-cells were affected by MG in MC in a dose-dependent manner. Using co-culture systems with HepG2 CYP3A4 cells, colon cancer cells were clearly protected from MG up to a concentration of 2 μM.
In conclusion, first-pass effect could be simulated in vitro in MG- and TX-treated PANC-1 cells and TX-treated MCF-7 cells as well as on MG-treated pCC-cells using HepG2 CYP3A4 cells. Obtained results with PANC-1 and MCF-7 could be validated with FH3 CYP3A4 cells. However, demonstration of the first-pass effect using different end-point measurement methods yielded different results and further studies are needed for definite conclusions.
Wind energy is a growing concern over the present awareness of lethal impact of green house gas emission. This energy source has been proven a promising alternative to fossil fuel based energy. Increased onshore wind capacity and decreased amount of low roughness wind sites has inspired the wind energy researchers to explore the possibilities of wind energy from high roughness sites such as urban area. Moreover, exhausted grid capacity between the wind energy producer from remote area and the consumer at city is also a major constrain for wind energy expansion. Driven by such motivation, this thesis has explored possibilities of wind energy conversion from buildings where energy is needed the most. Urban topography is known to be highly turbulent region considering its roughness characteristics.
Wind energy yield from urban aerodynamics is a vast arena of experimental research. Within the time frame of the thesis period and available opportunities, a brief description about the wind energy assessment modelling approach from urban flow was outlined. There are several possibilities of wind energy yield from the built structure, but only building integrated duct was focused in this thesis.
Time-averaged and global wind speed on the building integrated ducts, flow around the buildings was measured from wind tunnel and numerical analysis. Available wind energy yield and turbulence present in the locations measured from the flow was calculated based on the wind tunnel data and summarized with the pros and cons of the particular geometry. Elliptical duct configuration was found to achieve maximum energy yield from the omnidirectional free stream flow. However, simple rectangular duct configuration was determined as most efficient and optimized considering its simplicity, financial feasibility and relative energy yield with other duct configuration. The thesis also showed that on roof configuration is also very promising for wind energy exploration from the omnidirectional free stream flow.
Necessary recommendations were made based on available result for future development of the research approach. Scope and opportunities was mentioned. This investigation has proved that it is possible to extract limited amount of wind energy from building augmented ducts using concentrator effect of the building exterior. Thus, the thesis concluded that the wind energy yield from building augmented ducts using the concentrator effect of the building exterior is a promising renewable energy source.
Surface variations are an unavoidable byproduct of any manufacturing process and may lead to deviating part performance and even elevated part rejection rates. Because traditional computer aided-design approaches are aimed towards production of idealized, nominal geometric shapes, the wide geometric-and statistical-variability typical for any manufacturing process remains unrepresented and is frequently ignored during design. Thus, the present work aims at a more realistic design approach and, therefore, develops a collection of computer-aided design strategies for accurate representation, statistical analysis and prospective estimation of surface deviations with validation examples on aero engine turbine blades.
The CAD representation of real manufactured surfaces requires the ability to accurately recreate complex geometric shapes. This is achieved by automated re-parametrization of any CAD face of interest as B-spline surface with a rather dense control point grid. Face matching to scanned manufactured samples is then performed by calculating control point displacements, which successfully deliver surface representation errors below typical measurement uncertainties on multiple matching examples from turbine shank and hot-gas faces. Since inference of performance variability due to manufacturing is usually limited by the amount of scanned manufactured parts, a probabilistic model is formulated based on singular-value decomposition of control point displacements and identification of dominant manufacturing modes. This allows generation of an infinite set of synthetic deviating surfaces faithful to experimental deviation patterns.
Nominal geometric features may significantly differ between design iterations and manufacturing modes may not necessarily be transferable between different designs. Thus, deviation estimation may remain infeasible before manufacturing. To enable deviation estimation during the design phase, the present work proposes a machine learning strategy to identify deviation patterns explained by nominal geometric properties-such as relative position and local orientation-and use them for deviation estimation on new designs. This strategy is able to predict realistic stress variability induced by shank deviations of a turbine blade design using only surface deviation information from three given designs, which encourages machine-learning approaches as valuable tool for geometric deviation estimation as part of robust design.
Development of a hierarchically detailed chemical reaction mechanism from C₃ to C₅ hydrocarbons
(2022)
The oxidation of fuel molecules can be described by using a reaction mechanism, a tool that combines thermodynamic and transport properties with reaction rates to predict the behavior and sub-products at different temperatures, pressures and equivalence ratios. A detailed reaction mechanism helps to understand the fuel-specific pollutant formation process. The aim of this doctoral thesis is to generate a hierarchically-detailed chemical reaction mechanism from C3 to C5 hydrocarbons that can be used to understand the reaction decomposition pathways for different fuels at high temperature regime, e.g. propene, propane, butane isomers, butene isomers and pentene isomers. A new nomenclature based in the IUPAC rules, has been developed and implemented as part of this work. The naming follows the order of priority for choosing a principal characteristic group. These naming rules and some examples are explained here. As starting point for this investigation, the chemical model presented in Schenk et al. (2013) has been used. Thermodynamic data for sensitive species from C3 chemistry were revised and updated. Updates in reaction rates for n-butane (C4H10) and iso-butane (C4H10-Me2) are shown. The chemistry of the butene (C4H8) isomers have been revised and a correction taking into account the H-atom allyl abstraction is implemented. Laminar flame speeds and ignition delay times for the different isomers are presented and discussed together with experiments in similar conditions for burner-stabilized flame for the three butene and butane isomers.
The high-temperature chemistry for branched and linear C5H10 species is implemented in the model. 2-Methyl-2-butene (C5H10-D2Me2) is the most interesting isomer because 9 of its 10 C-H atoms are in allylic position and it is compared to n-Pentane as an example of a linear molecule. The validation of a burner-stabilized flame, ignition delay time, and laminar flame speed experiments for these fuels are presented and discussed. The compilation strategy was used and it aims to continuously increase the number and type of targets for mechanism validation.
Recent challenges and novel approaches of wireless communication networks are characterized by high performance requirements on the radio channel and by concepts of self-organization, in-network processing, or resource optimization which ultimately lead to distributed network applications, communication architectures, and radio transceivers.
Associated evaluation is driven by a multitude of ever-increasing requirements that call for multidisciplinary expertise. Depending on the discipline, simulation is one of the most widely used technologies, whereby often abstract assumptions and models do not allow for sufficiently accurate, comparable results.
In contrast, real-world measurements and field-tests can only be performed on actual systems, commonly under non-reproducible conditions.
This thesis establishes with the Split-Protocol-Stack a new type of evaluation method that intends to help closing the gap between purely simulative analyzes and real-world tests.
With the inclusion of real radio hardware and radio channels in the event-based simulation, this central hybrid approach in connection with the Radio-in-the-Loop methodology creates synergies in interdisciplinary fields.
The approach contains analytical discussions, methodological strategies, and practical contributions that are summarized as key elements in the subsequent central considerations and challenges.
With Real-Time-Shift, a pseudo-real-time synchronization approach for parallel simulation and radio channel emulation of communication flows is introduced.
Based on the underlying time compensation scheme, the discrete event simulation is decoupled from real-time constraints when exchanging event messages with real-world wireless hardware.
A physical layer emulation methodology and radio channel interface concept, called Radio-in-the-Loop, is introduced along with two practical realization approaches.
Furthermore, strategic details on radio network planning with an approach to automatic hardware resource allocation are presented for radio channel emulation-capable network testbeds.
The contributions of this work are evaluated using real-world reference measurements, practical application scenarios, and experiments that provide proof of concepts.
By means of an exemplary selected cross-layer optimization scenario, the benefits are practically demonstrated and discussed.
Finally, based on IEEE 802.15.4 as the reference protocol standard for low-power wireless networks, this thesis provides feasibility studies and analysis results using the representative prototype SEmulate for the Split-Protocol-Stack approach.
Water injection is investigated for turbocharged spark-ignition engines to reduce knock probability and enable higher engine efficiency. The novel approach of this work is the development of a simulation-based optimization process combining the advantages of detailed chemistry, the stochastic reactor model and genetic optimization to assess water injection. The fast running quasi-dimensional stochastic reactor model with tabulated chemistry accounts for water effects on laminar flame speed and combustion chemistry. The stochastic reactor model is coupled with the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm to find an optimum set of operating conditions for high engine efficiency. Subsequently, the feasibility of the simulation-based optimization process is tested for a three-dimensional computational fluid dynamic numerical test case. The newly proposed optimization method predicts a trade-off between fuel efficiency and low knock probability, which highlights the present target conflict for spark-ignition engine development. Overall, the optimization shows that water injection is beneficial to decrease fuel consumption and knock probability at the same time. The application of the fast running quasi-dimensional stochastic reactor model allows to run large optimization problems with low computational costs. The incorporation with the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm shows a well-performing multi-objective optimization and an optimized set of engine operating parameters with water injection and high compression ratio is found.
One of the standard approaches for solving discrete optimization problems which include the aspect of time, such as the traveling salesman problem with time windows, is to derive a so-called time-indexed formulation. If the problem has an underlying structure that can be described by a graph, the time-indexed formulation is usually based on a different, extended graph, commonly referred to as the time-expanded graph. The time-expanded graph can often be derived in such a way that all time constraints are incorporated in its topology, and therefore algorithms for the corresponding time-independent variant become applicable. The downside of this approach is that the sets of vertices and arcs of the time-expanded graph are much larger than the ones of the original graph. In recent works, however, it has been shown that for many practical applications a partial graph expansion that might contain time-infeasible paths, often suffices to find a proven optimal solution. These approaches, instead, iteratively refine the original graph and solve a relaxation of the time-expanded formulation in each iteration. When the solution of the current relaxation allows for a feasible schedule, an optimal solution can be derived from it and the algorithm terminates.
In this work, we first present new ideas that allow for the propagation of information about the optimal solution of a coarser graph to a more refined graph and show how these can be used in algorithms. More precisely, we present two general algorithms for solving Mixed Integer Linear Program formulations which we call iterative refinement and branch-and-refine. Iterative refinement basically is solving relaxations of the problem until a feasible solution to the original problem is found. Branch-and-refine is a kind of branch-and-bound algorithm that allows for the graph refinement to be carried out during the exploration of the branch-and-bound tree. For demonstrating the practical relevance of these algorithms, we not only study them in the context of academic examples but also apply them to two real-world problems. The first is a problem from the literature, where small passenger air-crafts have to be routed and scheduled to serve flight requests while fulfilling a variety of conditions on, for example, fuel consumption, weight, and detours. We show here that refinement algorithms can be used to improve the best known results from the literature. The second problem we consider is the task of optimally scheduling deliveries and charging times of delivery robots such that delays are minimized. In this case, we show that refinement algorithms perform better than a direct solution approach making use of state-of-the-art solvers.
This dissertation proposes a cross-layer framework able to synergistically optimize resilience and power consumption of processor-based systems. It is composed of three building blocks: SWIELD multimodal flip-flop (FF), System Operation Management Unit (SOMU) and Framework Function Library (FFL). Implementation of the building blocks is performed at circuit, architecture and software layer of the system stack respectively. The SWIELD FF can be configured to operate as a regular flip-flop or as an enhanced flip-flop for protection against timing/radiation-induced faults. It is necessary to perform replacement of selected timing-critical flip-flops in a system with SWIELD FFs during design time. When the system is active, the SWIELD FFs operation mode is dynamically managed by the SOMU controller according to the current requirements. Finally, the FFL contains a set of software procedures that greatly simplify framework utilization. By relying on the framework, a system can intelligently interchange techniques such as Adaptive Voltage/Frequency Scaling, selective Triple Modular Redundancy and clock gating during operation. Additionally, a simple and convenient strategy for integration of the framework in processor-based systems is also presented. A key feature of the proposed strategy is to determine the number of SWIELD FFs to be inserted in a system. Using this strategy, the framework was successfully embedded in instances of both single- and multicore systems. Various experiments were conducted to evaluate the framework influence on the target systems with respect to resilience and power consumption. At expense of about 1% area overhead, the framework is able to preserve performance and to reduce power consumption up to 15%, depending on the number of SWIELD FFs in the system. Furthermore, it was also shown that under certain conditions, the framework can provide failure-free system operation.
This analysis aims at the investigation of the techno-economic RES potentials and to minimize GHG emissions in the ENTSO-E. The ENTSO-E represents one of the world’s largest economic regions with a GDP of 19,835 billion US dollar (23%) and a primary energy consumption of 29,705 TWh (18%). ENTSO-E is coined with high degrees of fossil energy dependencies (49.9%) from third-party countries and contributes 3,517 Mt CO2eq (9%) to global GHG emissions. The Primary Sources onshore wind, offshore wind, utility-scale PV, and CSP techno-economic potentials are assessed via GIS-based georeferenced spatial analysis. Solar rooftop potentials are calculated based on a per capita approach. The Secondary Sources bioenergy, hydropower, geothermal, and hydrokinetic energy potentials are approximated based on meta-analysis. Primary and Secondary Sources potentials are input into the IES linear optimization model to simulate an energy system with high shares of RES and PTX. It is found that RES-based primary energy production potentials account for 13,492 TWh and energy dependency could be reduced by 6,482 TWh to 20.5%. Compared to the base year 1990, the direct GHG emission reduction amounts to 3,246 Mt CO2eq (70.7%). This reduction does not correspond with the EU reduction target of 80–95%. Hence, RES-based fuel imports, such as synthetic fuels and hydrogen, from third-party countries become necessary, to substitute fossil fuels and reduce domestic emissions. Additional GHG reduction potentials are suspected in the indirect emission sectors agriculture and waste management. In reference to the Sankey methodology, the analysis entails comprehensive energy flow balances for the ENTSO-E 2016 and 2050 energy systems. The ENTSO-E member countries exhibit heterogeneous properties regarding RES potentials, GHG emissions, and energy dependencies, and, hence, must be assessed individually. Integrated energy systems with high shares of RES and PTX represent a promising means to decrease direct energy use and non-energy use emissions as well as energy dependencies significantly.
In this dissertation, I present three research articles on the economics of wind energy in Germany. The first two chapters primarily assess onshore wind energy’s empirical value in the wholesale market. The third chapter discusses the efficiency of the German wind support scheme. In the first chapter, a database on German onshore wind turbines installed was created by using a general method to fill incomplete stock data. By using the database and highly granular wind speed data, hourly infeed and annual market values of around 25,700 wind turbines in Germany from 2005 to 2015 were calculated, and its drivers – infeed-price-correlation and standard deviation of infeed – analysed. Further, the spread in market values on turbine level was shown, regional differences quantified and the effect of turbine age on market values discussed. Turbines in central Germany had, on average, lower market values than turbines in the north, south or west of Germany. Modern turbines reached higher market values than older turbines. The second chapter on wind turbines’ market values covers the period until 2019. This analysis confirmed that market values were highly diverse on turbine level. Further, it explained why the market value of a single turbine matters in the market premium model. In this context, the magnitude of the outperformance of technologically advanced turbines was assessed. Last, the effect of inter-annual weather variability on wholesale electricity prices and market values was quantified, using 19 different years of winds speeds and infeed data. In the third chapter, it was analysed whether the German wind support scheme incentivised a cost-minimal capacity build-up. Two cost-minimal benchmark scenarios were developed and compared to the historical capacity build-up between 1995 and 2015. The costs of the benchmark scenarios were significantly lower than those of the historical build-up. The benchmark cost reduction largely stemmed from greater efficiency in terms of using better wind sites. It was further shown that a spatially concentrated capacity-build up, as induced in the benchmarks, is beneficial from a consumer’s point of view.
Within the last decades, the number of social networks is growing fast. The competition of retaining the customers to grow their platform and increase their profitability is rising. That is why companies need to detect possible churners to retain these. The problem of predicting the users’ lifetime, churning users, and the reasons for churning can be tackled by using machine learning.
The goal of this bachelor thesis is to build machine learning models to predict user churn and the user lifetime within the social network Jodel, a location-based anonymous messaging application for Android and iOS.
To get the best possible prediction results, we have started with extensive literature research, whose approaches we have tested and added to a machine learning pipeline to build predictive models. With these models, we have investigated the performance after different observation time windows and have finally compared the strongest models to detect similarities and understand the insights to learn their behaviour.
The results of this thesis are machine learning models for a selected representative set of communities varying in size within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and a country model leveraging all data. These models are used for a regression task by predicting the lifetime of a user and a multi-label classification of a user into six different churn classes. Additionally, we have also given models for a binary classification, where the model will predict if the user will churn within a given time or not. These models have shown general strong predictive power, which is shrinking when limiting the observation time window. Especially the binary classification yielded high accuracy of over 99%.
The best models have been used for predicting user churn within other communities to detect communities with possible similar behaviour. These similarities then have been determined by features’ importance, where the most important features have got fed back into empirics. This has shown statistically significant differences between user groups with a different active time but as of today no clear trends were visible that had led us to define the communities’ behaviours.
Since the competition of social networks is still growing, the retaining of users will stay a core marketing strategy, which will need to be tackled by machine learning and artificial intelligence. The created models could be useful for predicting churning users within the platform Jodel to detect these customers that will churn within a given time.
Researches did not focus much on anonymous and location-based messaging. That is why the results of this thesis on the anonymous messaging application Jodel opens a variety of possible tasks for the future in this context.