ALBERT

Description: Energies, Vol. 10, Pages 1351: Probabilistic Modeling of Electric Vehicle Charging Pattern Associated with Residential Load for Voltage Unbalance Assessment Energies doi: 10.3390/en10091351 Authors: Azhar Ul-Haq Marium Azhar Yousef Mahmoud Aqib Perwaiz Essam Al-Ammar It has been recognized that an increased penetration of electric vehicles (EVs) may potentially alter load profile in a distribution network. As EVs are regarded as a diversely distributed load so a deterministic method, to predict EV charging load, may not account for all possible factors that could affect the power system. Thus, a stochastic approach is applied that takes into account various realistic factors such as EV battery capacity, state of charge (SOC), driving habit/need, i.e., involving type and purpose of trip, plug-in time, mileage, recharging frequency per day, charging power rate and dynamic EV charging price under controlled and uncontrolled charging schemes. A probabilistic model of EVs charging pattern associated with residential load profile is developed. The probabilistic model gives an activity based residential load profile and EV charging pattern over a period of 24 h. Then, the model output is used to assess the power quality index such as voltage unbalance factor under different electric vehicle penetration levels at different nodes of the system. An uneven EV charging scenario is identified that could cause the voltage unbalance to exceed its permissible limit.

Description: Around 6 to 8 million young Nepali, working abroad as migrant laborers, are contributing remittances of about 28% of the annual gross domestic product of Nepal. However, due to the recent COVID-19 pandemic, Nepal is not only going to lose a significant portion of remittances but will also face the Herculean task of creating employment for the workforce who may return to Nepal. This paper discusses sustainable options for the Nepali government to help create employment for its citizens in Nepal through the revitalization of fallow lands and other potential agricultural areas, which are below a 15° slope. The land-use and land-cover data for the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s are derived from the classification of satellite images. These classified and resampled 30 m × 30 m images along with the 30 × 30 m elevation data are brought to the Kibana Platform within the Amazon Web Service (AWS) to analyze the status of land-use and -cover conditions for the 1980 to 2010 period within nine different slope classes at an interval of 5° slope. Our findings suggest there have been massive conversions of forested areas for agricultural land at lower slope areas between 1980 and 2000, but the trend began to reverse from 2000 to 2010 as trees started coming back to the fallow agricultural lands. This happened mainly because, during the countrywide Maoist insurgency period (1996–2006), many youth first took shelter in various urban centers away from their natal homes and then emigrated to foreign countries for remittance purposes. As a result, many farmlands became fallow and barren, and agricultural productivity decreased. Consequently, Nepal, an exporter of rice and pulses until the late 1980s, started importing food grain each year. The major goals of this research are to explore: (a) if Nepal can self-sustain in agricultural products by utilizing potential agricultural lands below a 15° slope in various geographic regions; (b) the means for productively engaging the youth returning to the country; and (c) methods of reinvigorating the ecosystem services of Nepal to support sustainable development.

Description: Background Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) is a clonal B-cell hematologic malignancy usually affecting only the lymphoid tissue, as extra-nodal (EN) involvement (e.g., bone, lung or liver) is seen only in ~15% of cases, much less than what is observed in non-Hodgkin lymphomas. To date, a small number of studies worldwide have investigated the epidemiology and clinical characteristics associated with HL with EN manifestations. Aim To describe risk factors and prognosis of EN involvement in HL patients. Methods Patients diagnosed with HL at King Abdullah University hospital (KAUH) between January 2004 and April 2018 were retrospectively reviewed for EN involvement, confirmed by histopathology of involved tissues. Risk factors assessed in our cohort of EN HL patients were: age, gender, presenting symptoms, B Symptoms, LDH levels, histological subtypes, CBC with differential, CT scans and PET/CT scans. International prognostic score (IPS) was also calculated. Results Among 140 HL patients included in our study, 16 of them (11.4%) had EN involvement. The mean age at diagnosis was 30 years old, ranging from 14-59. As in classic HL, men with EN involvement were slightly more affected than female (M/F, 10/6; 62.5% vs. 37.5%). Most of patients (N=8; 50%) had HL with mixed cellularity (MC); 6 patients (37.5%) had nodular sclerosing (NS); and 2 patients (12.5%) were classified as lymphocyte depleted (LD) subtype. Bone was the most compromised extra-nodal tissue as shown by the observation that 8 patients (50%) had bone involvement. Lungs pleura were affected in 7 patients (43.8%) and liver in 4 (25%) patients. The remaining subjects (N=4; 25%) showed involvement in other sites (skin, CNS and muscles). Out of our 16 EN HL patients, 6 of them (37.5%) had two EN tissues involved. EN HL patients were younger than patients without EN involvement (mean age, 30 vs. 37 years old respectively, P=.036 by unpaired t-test).EN HL patients with bone involvement were younger than those with liver or lung localization (mean age, 23.1 vs. 30.8 vs. 30.6 years old, respectively; P = 0.018 by unpaired t-test). We also observed a significant association between liver involvement and MC subtype. (P =0.032 by chi-square test). There was significant association between positive B symptoms and EN involvement. (P=.006 by chi-square test). There was no significant association between gender, high LDH levels, anemia, leukocytosis, lymphocytosis, monocytopenia, low albumin levels and EN involvement. There was significant association between IPS and EN involvement (56.25% of patients with EN involvement have high risk IPS, P=.00002 by chi-square test). All patients received ABVD as a first-line treatment. Seven patients (43.75%) experienced disease relapse during the follow-up period. There was a significant relationship between disease relapse and the type of HL, as 6 patients who experienced relapse had NS (P=0.0004 by chi-square), while only one MC. Overall survival rate was 75%, and 5-years survival rate was 45%. Four out of 7 patients who had disease relapse (57.1%) died, suggesting that disease relapse in EN HL might be a poor prognostic factor (P =0.045 by Kaplan Meier). There was no significant association between EN involvement and overall survival rate (P=.35 by Kaplan Meier). Conclusion Prevalence of EN involvement in patient with HL in Jordan is 11.4%, higher than that in Western countries and United States. In our cohort, EN involvement frequently presented as MC histological subtype; however, patients with NS showed the highest relapse rate. According to previous observations, bone and lungs were the most involved sites in our cohort, and patients with bone involvement were younger than those with other extra-nodal sites. Of note, our study might suggest some differences in the primary disease site in patients with HL possibly due to some geographic and ethnic variations. We also showed that risk and prognostic factors of classic HL are well applicable to EN HL, highlighting possible roles of histological subtypes in prognostication of EN HL. However, our preliminary findings need further validation in larger prospective studies. Disclosures No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.

Description: Introduction Microbial residents of the human oral cavity have long been a major focus of microbiology due to their influence on host health and intriguing patterns of site specificity amidst the lack of dispersal limitation. However, the determinants of niche partitioning in this habitat are yet to be fully understood, especially among taxa that belong to recently discovered branches of microbial life. Results Here, we assemble metagenomes from tongue and dental plaque samples from multiple individuals and reconstruct 790 non-redundant genomes, 43 of which resolve to TM7, a member of the Candidate Phyla Radiation, forming six monophyletic clades that distinctly associate with either plaque or tongue. Both pangenomic and phylogenomic analyses group tongue-specific clades with other host-associated TM7 genomes. In contrast, plaque-specific TM7 group with environmental TM7 genomes. Besides offering deeper insights into the ecology, evolution, and mobilome of cryptic members of the oral microbiome, our study reveals an intriguing resemblance between dental plaque and non-host environments indicated by the TM7 evolution, suggesting that plaque may have served as a stepping stone for environmental microbes to adapt to host environments for some clades of microbes. Additionally, we report that prophages are widespread among oral-associated TM7, while absent from environmental TM7, suggesting that prophages may have played a role in adaptation of TM7 to the host environment. Conclusions Our data illuminate niche partitioning of enigmatic members of the oral cavity, including TM7, SR1, and GN02, and provide genomes for poorly characterized yet prevalent members of this biome, such as uncultivated Flavobacteriaceae.