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Strategic water management on a river basin scale requires the inclusion of stakeholders from different sectors and the use of methodologies based on scientifically sound models and techniques, keeping in mind that the power of smaller and larger subgroups of stakeholders should be equal. In this paper, we present an approach to tackle this problem based on two Social Choice Theory (SCT) methods: preferential Borda Count and no-preferential Approval voting method. Two different scenarios of grouping members of the water committee of the San Francisco River Basin in Brazil are simulated, by interested sectors and by interested delegates from the states where the river passes through, five long-term management plans are evaluated and voted in either scenario. Results indicated that if members of the committee demonstrate reasonable competency and consistency while setting their judgments on management plans, the final group decision is the same or similar, regardless the method used. One of the conclusions is also that the voting of small subgroups may have the same power as the voting of a large subgroup in the social choice-based decision-making processes. SCT methods can thus be recommended as an equity framework to empower small groups in selecting long-term water management plans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The AAOS Annual Meeting in 2024 will be held in San Francisco from February 12 to 16. The meeting will offer a wide range of educational opportunities, including paper presentations, posters, symposia, panel sessions, expert sessions, debates, industry exhibits, and more. The meeting will also feature an emphasis on case-study presentations and will provide opportunities for attendees to earn CME hours and fulfill professional obligations. The meeting will include the OrthoDome experience, which offers immersive surgical videos, and will have a mobile app to help attendees navigate the event. The meeting will also include activities and events for orthopaedic surgery residents, Spanish-language programming, and will welcome Chile as the 2024 Guest Nation. [Extracted from the article]

Abstract A great deal of interest has been paid to enhance the radar range resolution for the last decades. One of the techniques is to construct a waveform combining inter-pulse and intra-pulse modulations. In this paper, stepped frequency (SF) waveform is used to represent the former, whereas phase coding (PC) is considered for the latter. To obtain the high-resolution range profile (HRRP) of a target induced by an SF waveform at the receiver, one of the approaches is the frequency domain (FD) algorithm. It has been successfully applied with SF linear frequency modulation waveforms. However, based on our investigations, processing the SFPC waveform with the FD algorithm does not lead to the performance, in terms of peak sidelobe ratio (PSLR) and integrated sidelobe ratio (ISLR), of the single-carrier phase coding (SCPC) waveform processed with a matched filter (MF). To overcome these drawbacks, we propose to split the spectrum of a phase coded pulse into a predetermined number of portions, and then to successively transmit the time-domain transformed versions of these various portions. The received echoes are then processed with a modified version of the FD algorithm. Our analysis and simulations show that the proposed waveform can be characterized by a PSLR and an ISLR close to those of the SCPC processed with MF in some scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]