Abstract
With the rise of usage in digital content in education, deaf and blind communities face communication barriers which as a result makes education less inclusive. These barriers do not allow them to integrate within the larger scholarly communities as most tools used for information dissemination remain inaccessible to them. This paper presents BDC-API (Blind/Deaf Communications API), a free-to-use modular toolkit that will ease accessibility for the blind and deaf communities to digital education content. This content includes the use cases of Massive Online Open Courses and Serious Games used in education. BDC-API incorporates the use of state of the art technologies such as, 3D sign language translator, grammar translation, voice recognition and text-to-speech. This paper demonstrates in greater detail, how these technologies culminate in the creation of an API ready to use for any educational digital content and how the BDC-API can ensure higher quality of digital content.

Abstract
In this paper, a hybrid single-objective metaheuristic, named as C-DEEPSO (Canonical Differential Evolutionary Particle Swarm Optimization), is proposed to solve large-scale optimization problems. C-DEEPSO can be viewed as an evolutionary algorithm with recombination rules borrowed from PSO or an swarm optimization method with selection and self-adaptiveness properties. To assess the algorithm performance, the algorithm is run over 15 benchmark continuous problems presented in CEC'2015. The algorithm is also applied over a real world large-scale problem. The results indicate that the proposed algorithm is an efficient and competitive method to handle such problems. The experimental results also show that the new approach reaches competitive results when compared to the reference algorithm DECC-G. An application of C-DEEPSO were perform to solve the electric dispatch in a large scale energy network, the IEEE 57 Bus-System. The results show that the algorithm is a good way to solve nonlinear problems respecting many constraints associated.

Abstract
Distributed energy resources (DERs) can provide a number of functions to be used in grid services with proper establishment of control and communication systems. However, there are neither general standards for vendor independent integration of these assets in management activities, nor common consideration of specific flexibilities that different DERs have. This paper investigates characterization and comparison of individual power and energy management flexibilities of different types of distributed energy resources. Emerging DER capability identification approaches are used to highlight contrasting differences between several energy storage and distributed generation options. Experiments were conducted in a low voltage test facility to compare flexibility limits using the same control and communication infrastructure. © 2018 IEEE.

Abstract
Growing number of inverter-based distributed energy resources (DERs) and sensitive loads increase the need for coordinated power management activities in islanded operation of microgrids. Especially low voltage networks have low inertia and high RA ratio, causing instability due to fluctuations in distributed generation (DG) and local voltage problems in islanded operation. This study investigates management of DERs that operate in current mode for providing voltage regulation support to master unit(s) in islanded operation of microgrids. A special focus was set on local voltage issues in low voltage (LV) network feeders. Field experiments in a large test facility highlighted management accuracy and corrective impact potential of DERs connected to different parts of a feeder.

Abstract
The inclusion of new energy management technologies in buildings and increasing integration of distributed energy resources in electricity networks will require new operation and planning approaches from system operators. Currently, distribution network planning is rather inefficient as network assets are oversized to meet the peak demand of a worst case scenario which is unlikely to occur. In addition, flexibility provided by controllable loads is not taken into account at all. This paper presents an innovative approach that integrates the potential flexibility of distributed energy resources in the planning exercise. It incorporates two optimization problems: a low-level one to optimize the operation of controllable resources; and a high-level one based on an OPF that uses the available flexibility to solve network problems. The proposed method allows obtaining costeffective solutions that make a better use of the flexible resources available, avoiding high capital investments in network reinforcement.

Abstract
Using power-hardware-in-the-loop is a solution for testing the behavior of devices on an emulated grid, with greater flexibility and avoiding the introduction of disturbances or critical operating conditions in the utility grid. This paper highlights the implementation of such a setup, its challenges and the solutions to cope with its limitations. The emulated grid is then used for the experimental validation of a 10kVA converter, regarding fault-ride-through, dynamic reactive current support and frequency and voltage based droop control, leading to the identification of design improvement recommendations.