Georeferenced database generation with the purpose of hydrologic molding in reservoirs of the hydrographic basin of Jaguaribe river in the state of Ceará, Brazil

The edafoclimatic conditions of the Brazilian semiarid region favor the water loss by surface runoff. The state of Ceará, almost completely covered by semiarid, has developed public policies for the construction of dams in order to attend the varied water demand. Several hydrological models were developed to support decisive processes in the complex management of reservoirs. This study aimed to establish a methodology for obtaining a georeferenced database suitable for use as input data in hydrological modeling in the semiarid of Ceará. It was used images of Landsat satellite and SRTM Mission, and soil maps of the state of Ceará. The Landsat images allowed the determination of the land cover and the SRTM Mission images, the automatic delineation of hydrographic basins. The soil type was obtained through the soil map. The database was obtained for Jaguaribe River hydrographic basin, in the state of Ceará, and is applicable to hydrological modeling based on the Curve Number method for estimating the surface runoff.

Primary and Revision Hip Replacement. A University Hospital Database and Registry Study

Large-headed total hip arthroplasty (THA) and hip resurfacing arthroplasty (HRA) with metal-on-metal (MoM) bearings became popular during the last decade. Recently, it has become evident that the large-head MoM hip implants are associated with increased revision rates despite their theoretical advantages. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the early results of primary MoM hip replacements and of acetabular revisions. I analyzed retrospectively the results of four MoM implant designs and the survival rate of acetabular revisions with impaction bone grafting, as documented in the Turku University Hospital database. Further, I evaluated the correlation between femoral head size and dislocation rate, and used the Finnish Arthroplasty Register data to compare the survival of three large-head MoM THAs to analogous HRAs. The early results for the Magnum M2A–ReCap THA were good. A larger head size decreased the risk of dislocation. Articular surface replacement (ASR) THA yielded inferior results compared to analogous HRA. For two other designs the results were similar. The R3–Synergy THA yielded inferior results compared to the reference implants. The survival of acetabular reconstructions with impaction bone grafting was inferior compared to previous reports. In conclusion, the early results of the Biomet ReCap–Magnum design were promising, and large head sizes decreased the dislocation rate. The survival of different MoM hip implant designs varied. The survival of new designs and techniques may be inferior to those reported by the clinics where implants are developed. An important caveat is that early promising results of new devices may rapidly worsen. New implants need to be introduced in a controlled fashion to the market; here, arthroplasty registers are a valuable tool that needs to be used.

Improving reporting management with relational database management system

Data management consists of collecting, storing, and processing the data into the format which provides value-adding information for decision-making process. The development of data management has enabled of designing increasingly effective database management systems to support business needs. Therefore as well as advanced systems are designed for reporting purposes, also operational systems allow reporting and data analyzing. The used research method in the theory part is qualitative research and the research type in the empirical part is case study. Objective of this paper is to examine database management system requirements from reporting managements and data managements perspectives. In the theory part these requirements are identified and the appropriateness of the relational data model is evaluated. In addition key performance indicators applied to the operational monitoring of production are studied. The study has revealed that the appropriate operational key performance indicators of production takes into account time, quality, flexibility and cost aspects. Especially manufacturing efficiency has been highlighted. In this paper, reporting management is defined as a continuous monitoring of given performance measures. According to the literature review, the data management tool should cover performance, usability, reliability, scalability, and data privacy aspects in order to fulfill reporting managements demands. A framework is created for the system development phase based on requirements, and is used in the empirical part of the thesis where such a system is designed and created for reporting management purposes for a company which operates in the manufacturing industry. Relational data modeling and database architectures are utilized when the system is built for relational database platform.

Adopting the Vaadin Java framework to rebuild VTT’s Web Interfaces and Database Applications

With the growth in new technologies, using online tools have become an everyday lifestyle. It has a greater impact on researchers as the data obtained from various experiments needs to be analyzed and knowledge of programming has become mandatory even for pure biologists. Hence, VTT came up with a new tool, R Executables (REX) which is a web application designed to provide a graphical interface for biological data functions like Image analysis, Gene expression data analysis, plotting, disease and control studies etc., which employs R functions to provide results. REX provides a user interactive application for the biologists to directly enter the values and run the required analysis with a single click. The program processes the given data in the background and prints results rapidly. Due to growth of data and load on server, the interface has gained problems concerning time consumption, poor GUI, data storage issues, security, minimal user interactive experience and crashes with large amount of data. This thesis handles the methods by which these problems were resolved and made REX a better application for the future. The old REX was developed using Python Django and now, a new programming language, Vaadin has been implemented. Vaadin is a Java framework for developing web applications and the programming language is extremely similar to Java with new rich components. Vaadin provides better security, better speed, good and interactive interface. In this thesis, subset functionalities of REX was selected which includes IST bulk plotting and image segmentation and implemented those using Vaadin. A code of 662 lines was programmed by me which included Vaadin as the front-end handler while R language was used for back-end data retrieval, computing and plotting. The application is optimized to allow further functionalities to be migrated with ease from old REX. Future development is focused on including Hight throughput screening functions along with gene expression database handling

Searching for music archives and composition manuscripts from the Viola database

Music archives and composition manuscripts from the Viola database.

The 19th Century Tombstone Database Project Records, 1790-1890 (non-inclusive)

The 19th Century Tombstone Database project was funded by the program Federal Summer Youth Employment scheme in the summer of 1982 and led by Dr. David W. Rupp, a Professor at the Classics Department, Brock University. The main goal of the project was to collect information related to various cemeteries in Niagara region and burials that took place from 1790-1890. Data was collected and presented in the form of data summary forms of persons, tombstone sketches, photographs of tombstones, maps, and computer printouts. The materials created as a result of a research completed for the 19th Century Tombstone Database project are important as a number of the tombstones have been damaged or gone missing since the research was finished. Before Dr. Rupp retired from Brock University, he donated project materials to the Brock University Special Collections and Archives.

Is Library Database Searching a Language Learning Activity?

A qualitative research study that asked international students how they thought of words to enter into a library database to see if language learning was also involved.

An Abstract Algebraic Theory of L-Fuzzy Relations for Relational Databases

Classical relational databases lack proper ways to manage certain real-world situations including imprecise or uncertain data. Fuzzy databases overcome this limitation by allowing each entry in the table to be a fuzzy set where each element of the corresponding domain is assigned a membership degree from the real interval [0…1]. But this fuzzy mechanism becomes inappropriate in modelling scenarios where data might be incomparable. Therefore, we become interested in further generalization of fuzzy database into L-fuzzy database. In such a database, the characteristic function for a fuzzy set maps to an arbitrary complete Brouwerian lattice L. From the query language perspectives, the language of fuzzy database, FSQL extends the regular Structured Query Language (SQL) by adding fuzzy specific constructions. In addition to that, L-fuzzy query language LFSQL introduces appropriate linguistic operations to define and manipulate inexact data in an L-fuzzy database. This research mainly focuses on defining the semantics of LFSQL. However, it requires an abstract algebraic theory which can be used to prove all the properties of, and operations on, L-fuzzy relations. In our study, we show that the theory of arrow categories forms a suitable framework for that. Therefore, we define the semantics of LFSQL in the abstract notion of an arrow category. In addition, we implement the operations of L-fuzzy relations in Haskell and develop a parser that translates algebraic expressions into our implementation.

Building a Canadian Virtual Health Library Database / Création de la Bibliothèque virtuelle canadienne de santé

Introduction: Avec l’abondance d’information gratuite disponible en ligne, la tâche de trouver, de trier et d’acheminer de l’information pertinente à l’auditoire approprié peut s’avérer laborieuse. En décembre 2010, la Bibliothèque virtuelle canadienne de santé / Canadian Virtual Health Library (BVCS) a formé un comité d’experts afin d’identifier, d’évaluer, de sélectionner et d’organiser des ressources d’intérêt pour les professionnels de la santé. Méthodes: Cette affiche identifiera les décisions techniques du comité d’experts, incluant le système de gestion de contenus retenu, l’utilisation des éléments Dublin Core et des descripteurs Medical Subject Headings pour la description des ressources, et le développement et l’adaptation de taxonomies à partir de la classification MeSH. La traduction française des descripteurs MeSH à l’aide du portail CISMeF sera également abordée. Résultats: Au mois de mai 2011, le comité a lancé la base de données BVCS de ressources en ligne gratuites sur la santé, regroupant plus de 1600 sites web et ressources. Une variété de types de contenus sont représentés, incluant des articles et rapports, des bases de données interactives et des outils de pratique clinique. Discussion: Les bénéfices et défis d’une collaboration pancanadienne virtuelle seront présentés, ainsi que l’inclusion cruciale d’un membre francophone pour composer avec la nature bilingue de la base de données. En lien avec cet aspect du projet, l’affiche sera présentée en français et en anglais. Introduction: With the abundance of freely available online information, the task of finding, filtering and fitting relevant information to the appropriate audience, is daunting. In December 2010 the Canadian Virtual Health Library / Bibliothèque virtuelle canadienne de santé (CVHL) formed an expert committee to identify, evaluate, select and organize resources relevant to health professionals. Methods: This poster will identify the key technical decisions of the expert committee including the content management system used to manage the data, the use of Dublin Core elements and Medical Subject Headings to describe the resources, and the development and adaptation of taxonomies from MeSH classification to catalog resources. The translation of MeSH terms to French using the CiSMeF portal will also be discussed. Results: In May 2010, the committee launched the CVHL database of free web-based health resources. Content ranged from online articles and reports to videos, interactive databases and clinical practice tools, and included more than 1,600 websites and resources. Discussion: The benefits and challenges of a virtual, pan-Canadian collaboration, and the critical inclusion of a Francophone member to address the bilingual nature of the database, will be presented. In keeping with the nature of the project, the poster will be presented in French and English.

The Hygiene Hypothesis and the risk of Crohn’s disease : a case-control study utilizing prospectively-collected exposure data from an administrative database

La maladie de Crohn (MC) pédiatrique a des conséquences majeures sur la qualité de vie des patients atteints (troubles de croissance, absentéisme scolaire, etc). L’étiologie de la MC est inconnue. La théorie de l’hygiène (TH) stipule que les conditions de vie sanitaires des pays industrialisés préviennent l’exposition antigénique et empêchent le développement de la tolérance immunitaire chez les enfants. Ceci mènerait à une réaction excessive du système immunitaire lors d’expositions subséquentes et engendrerait le développement de maladies inflammatoires chroniques telles la MC. Objectif: Analyser l’association entre la fréquence, la temporalité et le type d’infections infantiles (indicateurs d’environnements pourvus d’antigènes) et le risque de MC pédiatrique. Une étude cas-témoin fût réalisée, les cas de MC provenant d’un centre hospitalier tertiaire montréalais. Les témoins, provenant des registres de la Régie d’assurance maladie du Québec (RAMQ), furent appariés aux cas selon leur âge, sexe et lieu de résidence. L’exposition aux infections fût déterminée grâce aux codes de diagnostic ICD-9 inscrits dans la base de données de la RAMQ. Un modèle de régression logistique conditionnelle fût construit afin d’analyser l’association entre infections et MC. Des ratios de cotes (RC) et intervalles de confiance à 95% (IC 95%) furent calculés. Résultats: 409 cas et 1621 témoins furent recrutés. Les résultats de l’analyse suggèrent un effet protecteur des infections infantiles sur le risque de MC (RC: 0,67 [IC: 0,48-0,93], p=0,018), plus particulièrement au cours des 5 premières années de vie (RC: 0.74 [IC: 0,57-0,96], p=0,025). Les infections rénales et urinaires, ainsi que les infections des voies orales et du système nerveux central (virale), semblent particulièrement associées à l’effet protecteur. Les résultats de l’étude appuient la théorie de l’hygiène: l’exposition aux infections infantiles pourrait réduire le risque de MC pédiatrique.

Una aproximación evolucionista para la generación automática de sentencias SQL a partir de ejemplos

En la actualidad, el uso de las tecnologías ha sido primordial para el avance de las sociedades, estas han permitido que personas sin conocimientos informáticos o usuarios llamados “no expertos” se interesen en su uso, razón por la cual los investigadores científicos se han visto en la necesidad de producir estudios que permitan la adaptación de sistemas, a la problemática existente dentro del ámbito informático. Una necesidad recurrente de todo usuario de un sistema es la gestión de la información, la cual se puede administrar por medio de una base de datos y lenguaje específico, como lo es el SQL (Structured Query Language), pero esto obliga al usuario sin conocimientos a acudir a un especialista para su diseño y construcción, lo cual se ve reflejado en costos y métodos complejos, entonces se plantea una pregunta ¿qué hacer cuando los proyectos son pequeñas y los recursos y procesos son limitados? Teniendo como base la investigación realizada por la universidad de Washington[39], donde sintetizan sentencias SQL a partir de ejemplos de entrada y salida, se pretende con esta memoria automatizar el proceso y aplicar una técnica diferente de aprendizaje, para lo cual utiliza una aproximación evolucionista, donde la aplicación de un algoritmo genético adaptado origina sentencias SQL válidas que responden a las condiciones establecidas por los ejemplos de entrada y salida dados por el usuario. Se obtuvo como resultado de la aproximación, una herramienta denominada EvoSQL que fue validada en este estudio. Sobre los 28 ejercicios empleados por la investigación [39], 23 de los cuales se obtuvieron resultados perfectos y 5 ejercicios sin éxito, esto representa un 82.1% de efectividad. Esta efectividad es superior en un 10.7% al establecido por la herramienta desarrollada en [39] SQLSynthesizer y 75% más alto que la herramienta siguiente más próxima Query by Output QBO[31]. El promedio obtenido en la ejecución de cada ejercicio fue de 3 minutos y 11 segundos, este tiempo es superior al establecido por SQLSynthesizer; sin embargo, en la medida un algoritmo genético supone la existencia de fases que amplían los rangos de tiempos, por lo cual el tiempo obtenido es aceptable con relación a las aplicaciones de este tipo. En conclusión y según lo anteriormente expuesto, se obtuvo una herramienta automática con una aproximación evolucionista, con buenos resultados y un proceso simple para el usuario “no experto”.

Diversified query expansion

La diversification des résultats de recherche (DRR) vise à sélectionner divers documents à partir des résultats de recherche afin de couvrir autant d’intentions que possible. Dans les approches existantes, on suppose que les résultats initiaux sont suffisamment diversifiés et couvrent bien les aspects de la requête. Or, on observe souvent que les résultats initiaux n’arrivent pas à couvrir certains aspects. Dans cette thèse, nous proposons une nouvelle approche de DRR qui consiste à diversifier l’expansion de requête (DER) afin d’avoir une meilleure couverture des aspects. Les termes d’expansion sont sélectionnés à partir d’une ou de plusieurs ressource(s) suivant le principe de pertinence marginale maximale. Dans notre première contribution, nous proposons une méthode pour DER au niveau des termes où la similarité entre les termes est mesurée superficiellement à l’aide des ressources. Quand plusieurs ressources sont utilisées pour DER, elles ont été uniformément combinées dans la littérature, ce qui permet d’ignorer la contribution individuelle de chaque ressource par rapport à la requête. Dans la seconde contribution de cette thèse, nous proposons une nouvelle méthode de pondération de ressources selon la requête. Notre méthode utilise un ensemble de caractéristiques qui sont intégrées à un modèle de régression linéaire, et génère à partir de chaque ressource un nombre de termes d’expansion proportionnellement au poids de cette ressource. Les méthodes proposées pour DER se concentrent sur l’élimination de la redondance entre les termes d’expansion sans se soucier si les termes sélectionnés couvrent effectivement les différents aspects de la requête. Pour pallier à cet inconvénient, nous introduisons dans la troisième contribution de cette thèse une nouvelle méthode pour DER au niveau des aspects. Notre méthode est entraînée de façon supervisée selon le principe que les termes reliés doivent correspondre au même aspect. Cette méthode permet de sélectionner des termes d’expansion à un niveau sémantique latent afin de couvrir autant que possible différents aspects de la requête. De plus, cette méthode autorise l’intégration de plusieurs ressources afin de suggérer des termes d’expansion, et supporte l’intégration de plusieurs contraintes telles que la contrainte de dispersion. Nous évaluons nos méthodes à l’aide des données de ClueWeb09B et de trois collections de requêtes de TRECWeb track et montrons l’utilité de nos approches par rapport aux méthodes existantes.

Intelligent Agent-based Multilingual Information Retrieval System

The goal of this work is to develop an Open Agent Architecture for Multilingual information retrieval from Relational Database. The query for information retrieval can be given in plain Hindi or Malayalam; two prominent regional languages of India. The system supports distributed processing of user requests through collaborating agents. Natural language processing techniques are used for meaning extraction from the plain query and information is given back to the user in his/ her native language. The system architecture is designed in a structured way so that it can be adapted to other regional languages of India