Freshwater ecosystems are among the most threatened in the world, while providing numerous essential ecosystem services (ES) to humans. Despite their importance, research on freshwater ecosystem services is limited. Here, we examine how freshwater studies could help to advance ES research and vice versa. We summarize major knowledge gaps and suggest solutions focusing on science and policy in Europe. We found several features that are unique to freshwater ecosystems, but often disregarded in ES assessments. Insufficient transfer of knowledge towards stakeholders is also problematic. Knowledge transfer and implementation seems to be less effective towards South-east Europe. Focusing on the strengths of freshwater research regarding connectivity, across borders, involving multiple actors can help to improve ES research towards a more dynamic, landscape-level approach, which we believe can boost the implementation of the ES concept in freshwater policies. Bridging these gaps can contribute to achieve the ambitious targets of the EU’s Green Deal.

Mapping variations in the attenuation of seismic energy is important for understanding dissipative mechanisms in the lithosphere, and for modeling ground shaking associated with earthquakes. We cross-correlate ambient seismic signal recorded across the EarthScope Transportable Array in the 3–15 s period range. We apply to the resulting cross correlations a new method to estimate lateral variations in Rayleigh-wave attenuation, as a function of period, beneath North America. Between 3 and 6 s, our maps are dominated by a strong eastward decrease in attenuation. This pattern vanishes at longer periods, confirming early observations based on regional earthquakes. Attenuation maps and phase-velocity maps are anti-correlated at periods between 3 and 6 s, but the anti-correlation is also largely lost at longer periods. This corresponds to the attenuation coefficient decreasing with period more rapidly in the west than in the east, while the change in phase velocity with period is more uniform across the continent. Our results point to a transition in the properties of upper-crustal materials with depth, probably related to the closure of fluid-filled cracks and pores, and imply that measures of attenuation from seismic noise carry significant information on crustal rheology.

The evolution towards Industry 4.0 is driving the need for innovative solutions in the area of network management, considering the complex, dynamic and heterogeneous nature of ICT supply chains. To this end, Intent-Based networking (IBN) which is already proven to evolve how network management is driven today, can be implemented as a solution to facilitate the management of large ICT supply chains. In this paper, we first present a comparison of the main architectural components of typical IBN systems and, then, we study the key engineering requirements when integrating IBN with ICT supply chain network systems while considering AI methods. We also propose a general architecture design that enables intent translation of ICT supply chain specifications into lower level policies, to finally show an example of how the access control is performed in a modeled ICT supply chain system.

In the quest of large-scale quantum computers, multi-core distributed architectures are considered a compelling alternative to be explored. A crucial aspect in such approach is the stringent demand on communication among cores when qubits need to interact, which conditions the scalability potential of these architectures. In this work, we address the question of how the cost of the communication among cores impacts on the viability of the quantum multi-core approach. Methodologically, we consider a design space in which architectural variables (number of cores, number of qubits per core), application variables for several quantum benchmarks (number of qubits, number of gates, percentage of two-qubit gates) and inter-core communication latency are swept along with the definition of a figure of merit. This approach yields both a qualitative understanding of trends in the design space and companion dimensioning guidelines for the architecture, including optimal points, as well as quantitative answers to the question of beyond which communication performance levels the multi-core architecture pays off. Our results allow to determine the thresholds for inter-core communication latency in order for multi-core architectures to outperform single-core quantum processors.

In the quest of large-scale quantum computers, multi-core distributed architectures are considered a compelling alternative to be explored. A crucial aspect in such approach is the stringent demand on communication among cores when qubits need to interact, which conditions the scalability potential of these architectures. In this work, we address the question of how the cost of the communication among cores impacts on the viability of the quantum multi-core approach. Methodologically, we consider a design space in which architectural variables (number of cores, number of qubits per core), application variables for several quantum benchmarks (number of qubits, number of gates, percentage of two-qubit gates) and inter-core communication latency are swept along with the definition of a figure of merit. This approach yields both a qualitative understanding of trends in the design space and companion dimensioning guidelines for the architecture, including optimal points, as well as quantitative answers to the question of beyond which communication performance levels the multi-core architecture pays off. Our results allow to determine the thresholds for inter-core communication latency in order for multi-core architectures to outperform single-core quantum processors.

The goal of head and neck oncological surgery is complete tumor resection with adequate resection margins while preserving acceptable function and appearance. For oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma (OCSCC), different studies showed that only 15%-26% of all resections are adequate. A major reason for the low number of adequate resections is the lack of information during surgery; the margin status is only available after the final histopathologic assessment, days after surgery. The surgeons and pathologists at the Erasmus MC University Medical Center in Rotterdam started the implementation of specimen-driven intraoperative assessment of resection margins (IOARM) in 2013, which became the standard of care in 2015. This method enables the surgeon to turn an inadequate resection into an adequate resection by performing an additional resection during the initial surgery. Intraoperative assessment is supported by a relocation method procedure that allows accurate identification of inadequate margins (found on the specimen) in the wound bed. The implementation of this protocol resulted in an improvement of adequate resections from 15%-40%. However, the specimen-driven IOARM is not widely adopted because grossing fresh tissue is counter-intuitive for pathologists. The fear exists that grossing fresh tissue will deteriorate the anatomical orientation, shape, and size of the specimen and therefore will affect the final histopathologic assessment. These possible negative effects are countered by the described protocol. Here, the protocol for specimen-driven IOARM is presented in detail, as performed at the institute.

In the context of public safety, 5G offers great opportunities towards enhancing mission-critical services, by running network functions at the network edge to provide reliable and low-latency services. This demo introduces an on-demand Back Situation Awareness (BSA) application service, in a multi-domain scenario, enabling early notification for vehicles of an approaching Emergency Vehicle (EmV), indicating its Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA). The application provides the drivers ample time to create a safety corridor for the EmV to pass through unhindered in a safe manner thereby increasing the mission success. For this demo, we have developed an orchestrated MEC platform on which we have implemented the BSA service following modern cloud-native principles, based on Docker and Kubernetes.

We aimed to investigate the diagnostic performance of new 2-D shear-wave elastography (SWE) with propagation maps and attenuation imaging (ATI) for quantification of fibrosis and steatosis in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Consecutive patients with NAFLD and healthy volunteers underwent liver stiffness measurement and steatosis quantification by means of vibration-controlled transient elastography coupled with the controlled attenuation parameter as the reference and by 2-D shear-wave elastography (2-D-SWE) with propagation maps and ATI as the investigational methods. We included 232 participants (164 in the NAFLD group and 68 in the healthy control group): 51.7%/49.3% women/men; mean age, 54.2 ± 15.2 y; mean body mass index, 29.4 ± 6.5 kg/m2. Significant correlations were found between 2-D-SWE and vibration-controlled transient elastography (r = 0.71, p < 0.0001) and between ATI and the controlled attenuation parameter (r = 0.72, p < 0.0001). NAFLD-specific 2-D-SWE liver stiffness measurement cutoffs were as follows-F ≥ 2: 7.9 kPa (area under the curve [AUC] = 0.91); F ≥ 3: 10 kPa (AUC = 0.92); and F = 4: 11.4 kPa (AUC = 0.95). For steatosis, the best cutoffs by ATI were as follows-S1 = 0.73 dB/cm/MHz (AUC = 0.86); S2 = 0.76 dB/cm/MHz (AUC = 0.86); and S3 = 0.80 dB/cm/MHz (AUC = 0.83). According to Baveno VI criteria, the optimal 2-D-SWE liver stiffness measurement for diagnosing liver cirrhosis is 15.5 kPa (AUC = 0.94), and for ruling out compensated advanced chronic liver disease it is 9.2 kPa (AUC = 0.92). To conclude, 2-D-SWE with propagation maps and ATI is reliable for quantification of liver fibrosis and steatosis in patients with NAFLD.