Background: Surging volumes of patients with COVID-19 and the high infectiousness of SARS-CoV-2 challenged hospital infection control/safety, staffing, care delivery and operations as few crises have. Imperatives to ensure security of patient information, defend against cybersecurity threats and accurately identify/authenticate patients and staff were undiminished, which fostered creative use cases where hospitals leveraged identity access and management (IAM) technologies to improve infection control and minimise disruption of clinical and administrative workflows.
Methods: Working with a leading IAM solution provider, implementation personnel in the USA and UK identified all hospitals/health systems where an innovative use of IAM technology improved facility infection control and pandemic response management.
In Europe, policy frameworks demand the monitoring of microplastics in marine sediments. Here we provide a monitoring and data analysis method for microplastic particles designed to be used in the context of Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) and OSPAR policy frameworks. Microplastics were analysed in marine sediments at four different locations in Dutch coastal and transitional waters using replicate sampling to investigate micro-spatial variation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOne of the most effective ways of gaining user experience and minimizing user effects on modelling and simulation is benchmarking. Currently (2022) a new experimental workplace, the so called 'Mini Labyrinth' is being developed at Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava (STU). It is a simple neutron and gamma shielding benchmark, inspired by the ALARM-CF-AIR-LAB-001 ICSBEP experiment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAssessment methods on data quality and environmental variability are lacking for microplastics (MP). Here we assess occurrence and variability of MP number concentrations in two Dutch rivers. Strict QA/QC procedures were applied to identify MP using Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) microscopy followed by state of the art automated image analysis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBehav Ecol Sociobiol
April 2015
Spreading reproduction across time or space can optimize fitness by minimizing the risks for offspring survival in varying and unpredictable environments. Poison frogs (Dendrobatidae) are characterized by complex spatial and reproductive behaviour, such as territoriality, prolonged courtship and parental care. The partitioning of larvae from terrestrial clutches across several water bodies is mainly known from species with carnivorous tadpoles that allocate their tadpoles in very small pools, where limited food availability is accompanied by an increased risk of cannibalism.
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