bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
An investigation into the role of mothers in the care of hospitalized children as perceived by mothers and nurses in pediatric units of BPKIHS, Dharan, Nepal
Authors: Yadav Upendra , Karn BK , Shah S , Chaudhary RN
Published: June 2017

Background: Over the last three decades the annual number of deaths among children less than 5 years of age has decreased by almost one third. However, this reduction has not been evenly distributed throughout the worldObjective: The aim of the present study was to identify the role perception of mothers and nurses in the care of hospitalized children.Method: Comparative survey design was adopted for the study. A simple random sampling technique for mothers and purposive sampling for the nurses were used in selecting the subjects. The sample comprised of 50 mothers and 50 nurses. The data was collected by using interview schedule for mothers and semi-structured questionnaire for the nurses. The data obtained was analyzed using the descriptive and inferential statistics.Result: The study results showed that, 84% of mothers strongly agreed and 56% of nurses strongly agreed, with the role of mothers in the care of hospitalized children. Regarding comparison of the role of mothers as perceived by mothers and nurses, were found positively significant. As regards to relationship between the perceptions of mothers on her role with the selected background factors, revealed that there was no significant relationship.Conclusion: Mother’s role in the care of hospitalized children is vital, as all expectations of satisfaction, trust and security of the child are vested in her. Mothers being a primary care provider of child has limited role in hospital but still can contribute in recovery of children.Health Renaissance 2015;13(2): 14-21
Drug utilization pattern in four major wards of a tertiary hospital in eastern Nepal
Authors: Sarraf Deependra Prasad , Rauniar G P , Misra A
Published: June 2017

Background: Drugs play an important role in protecting, maintaining and restoring health. Drugs are prescribed irrationally throughout the world.Objective: To study the utilization of drugs in in-patient of four major ward of a tertiary care hospital in Nepal.Method: This was a cross-sectional descriptive study conducted in four major wards for duration of one month.Result: A total of 467 patients were prescribed a total of 2188 drugs among which 535 drugs were prescribed in surgery ward, 567 drugs in medicine ward, 220 drugs in pediatric ward and 866 drugs in obstetrics and gynecology ward. The average number of drugs per prescription was 4.68. All drugs were prescribed by brand names and generic prescribing was nil. Among all, 70.61% of drugs were from essential list of drugs.43.87% of drugs were given through injections. 34.41%, 26.05%, 11.7%, 6.35%, 6.17% and 4.84% of prescribed drugs were AMA, GIT, MSK, CNS, CVS and minerals and vitamins respectively. Four drugs per prescription were prescribed to 21.41% of the total patients (n=467).Conclusion: Polypharmacy, low rate of generic prescriptions and overuse of antibiotics still remain a problem in health care facilities in Nepal. This calls for sustained interventional strategies and periodic audit at all levels of health care to avoid the negative consequences of inappropriate prescriptions.Health Renaissance 2015;13(2): 50-65
Acute flaccid paralysis: An approach to diagnosis
Authors: Yadav Ashok Kumar , Bhattarai P , Aryal B , Gupta PP , Chaudhari S , Yadav A
Published: June 2017

Acute flaccid paralysis (AFP) is a common presentation to the emergency department and can present with paralysis of single to several limbs. Here is a case with AFP presented to highlight the approach to diagnosis. A 25 years male who recently returned from Malaysia presented to the emergency ward with acute onset of paralysis for two days which was progressive and was gradually involving the chest muscles as well. He had a history of loose mucoid stool since 4-5 days but there were no rashes or exanthema in the body. On complete examination, apart from diminished power in all the limbs, there were no other positive findings. He was started on expectant management and no other medications except multivitamins were prescribed. Patient was discharged home on patient party’s request and on follow-up after 14 days, patient's had improved.Health Renaissance 2015;13(2): 164-169
Improving the productivity and purity of vaterite produced via a refined bubbling method
Authors: Chen Peiyuan , Ma Honghao , Xu Ying , Shen Zhaowu
Published: June 2017

The bubbling method has been refined to produce vaterite with both high productivity and purity for its promising applications. This involves: a) adding an adequate amount of ammonia water to achieve maximum precipitation of Ca2+, b) refining CO2 bubble sizes into microns by a designed gas disperser, and c) using optimal final pH condition and CO2 flow rate to obtain vaterite with both high productivity and purity. In addition, the conservation of vaterite was also investigated by exposing vaterite to two moist environments. The results show that 95.1 % pure vaterite can be produced with 88.8 % yield at a final pH value of 8.6 and CO2 flow rate of 11 l min−1. The corresponding vaterite particles mostly have a hollow structure. The conservation of vaterite is very sensitive to moisture, and it transforms into calcite gradually depending on the moisture content.
Chemical composition and biological activity of Nepeta cilicica
Authors: Iscan Gökalp , Göger Fatih , Demirci Betül , Köse Yavuz Bülent
Published: June 2017

In the present study, aerial parts of Nepeta cilicica were hydro-distilled for the essential oil. Furthermore, air-dried plant materials were extracted with methanol. According to GC-MS results, 35 compounds were characterized in the oil (totally 92%). Caryophyllene oxide, ?-caryophyllene and spathulenol (28.2, 8.9 and 4.2%) were found as main components of the oil. Sixteen compounds were detected by LC/MS, most of which were caffeoylquinic acid, luteolin and apigenin derivatives, in methanolic extract of the N. cilicica. Apart from DPPH radical scavenging activity, inhibitory effects on bacterial and yeast growth of essential oil and the methanolic extract were evaluated. Twenty-four different pathogenic bacterial and Candida strains were tested by M7-A7 and CLSI M27-A2 protocols respectively. The crude extract showed better inhibitory effects against bacteria strains than the essential oil. Both oil and the extract demonstrated strong inhibition on C. tropicalis at a concentration of 47.0 µg/mL (MIC).
Video Clip of Methodology:
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Poetry as a Foreign Language in Heather Dohollau and André du Bouchet
Authors: O'Connor Clémence
Published: June 2017

This essay focuses on André du Bouchet (1924–2001) and Heather Dohollau (1925–2013), a Welsh poet who lived most of her life in France and is only published in French. Poised as they are between French and English, these poets are uniquely placed to participate in current reassessments of language and bilingualism. Both poets were translators and relied on the experience of linguistic defamiliarization in their poetic practice. They view poetry as the translation of a language into, and out of, itself. By drawing attention to language in its materiality, and to the poem as a visual form, their poetics of ‘difficulty’ (Dohollau) or ‘surprise’ (du Bouchet) compels the Francophone reader to adopt a foreign perspective on his or her own language. Poetry is thus reinvented as the idiome dreamt of by Derrida: a defamiliarizing other language, potentially able to translate otherness in its own terms.
Catholic Translation and Protestant Translation: The Reception of Luis de Granada's Devotional Prose in Early Modern England
Authors: Castillo Miriam
Published: June 2017

Through a survey of the translations produced by Richard Hopkins, Francis Meres, Thomas Lodge, and others, this essay investigates the various audiences Luis de Granada's writings had, and the different ways in which they were both received and rendered into English. The translators’ aims, and, in particular, their attitudes to the doctrinal positions they found his writings to espouse, are examined. This involves asking how Granada's works were modified for audiences of different religious persuasions within the general context of Anglo-Hispanic relations in this period, and more particularly of the place of Catholic texts in a no longer Catholic England.
When Spring is not a Spring: Revisiting Feinstein's Tsvetaeva
Authors: Whyte Christopher
Published: June 2017

Elaine Feinstein's translations of Tsvetaeva have acquired a near-classic status. Paul Muldoon pointed out, however, that in one case a stanza from one of the originals was omitted without explanation, and close examination of other examples reveals further unexplained omissions, reorderings, conflations, and splittings of Tsvetaeva's compositions in Feinstein's renderings. From this point, other questions are asked about how much justice is done to the Russian poems by this non-Russian-speaking translator.
Warren Hastings as a Translator of Latin Poetry
Authors: Gillespie Stuart
Published: June 2017

Warren Hastings composed occasional short verse translations and imitations of classical Latin texts over many years, perhaps particularly in later life. Almost all extant examples are recorded in autograph in the multiple volumes of his diaries now in the British Library (in some cases, elsewhere too). They have never been printed nor given scholarly attention, but are of very high quality. This note contextualizes and provides transcriptions of six of these works, viz. translations and imitations of Lucan (two passages), Horace (three odes), and Catullus.
Effect of Sulfur-Containing Primers for Noble Metals on the Bond Strength of Self-Cured Acrylic Resin
Authors: Yoshida Keiichi
Published: June 2017

This study investigated the effect of sulfur-containing primers for noble metals on the shear bond strength of self-cured acrylic resin after thermal cycling (TC). Four pure metals (Au, Ag, Cu, and Pd) and type IV Au alloy were either untreated, or treated with one of the five sulfur-containing metal primers (V-Primer, Metaltite, Alloy Primer, Metal Link Primer, and Metal Primer Z). Afterwards, a brass ring was placed on the metal surface and filled with self-cured acrylic resin (n = 10). The bond strengths were measured after 24 h (TC0) and after 2000 thermal cycles at 4–60 °C (TC2000). Three-way ANOVA and Tukey compromise post hoc tests were used to analyze the data (α = 0.05). All of the sulfur-containing primers significantly improved the resin bond strength as compared to that of the non-primed group at TC0 regardless of the metal type (p < 0.05). However, at TC2000, the bond strengths between the resin and the five metals significantly decreased with respect to the values obtained at TC0 regardless of the primer (p < 0.05). The sulfur-containing metal primers, except for Metal Link Primer, were found to be more effective for improving the bond strength between the self-cured acrylic resin and Ag as compared to the other three pure metals (p < 0.05). The bond strengths between the resin and Au and type IV Au alloy at TC2000 were the highest ones when Metal Primer Z was used.
Proto-Acting as a New Concept: Personal Mimicry and the Origins of Role Playing
Authors: Brown Steven
Published: June 2017

Proto-acting is introduced here as a new concept that refers to a set of processes that are intermediate between everyday role playing (in the Erving Goffman sense) and dramatic acting. Its most characteristic process is the voluntary act of personal mimicry, which can occur in everyday contexts, such as quoting someone during conversation, or in performance contexts, such as impressionism. Proto-acting involves character portrayal, but on a much simpler and more transient scale than in dramatic acting, where a person may portray a character for an extended period of time during a stage performance. For example, this might involve impersonating the characters while reading a bedtime story to a child, or children themselves portraying characters while engaging in pretend play. Other key features of proto-acting are that it tends to be driven by gesture, have minimal scripting, and involve short bouts of alternation between the self and characters. Proto-acting, as based on personal mimicry, might provide a cognitive foundation for dramatic acting in human development. Moreover, proto-acting itself might be underlain evolutionarily by the process of pantomime, which often involves intentional mimicry of the actions of other people. Hence, the proto-acting concept is able to shed light on processes relevant to cognition, development, the performing arts, and human evolution.
Community Response to Multiple Sound Sources: Integrating Acoustic and Contextual Approaches in the Analysis
Authors: Lercher Peter , De Coensel Bert , Dekonink Luc , Botteldooren Dick
Published: June 2017

Sufficient data refer to the relevant prevalence of sound exposure by mixed traffic sources in many nations. Furthermore, consideration of the potential effects of combined sound exposure is required in legal procedures such as environmental health impact assessments. Nevertheless, current practice still uses single exposure response functions. It is silently assumed that those standard exposure-response curves accommodate also for mixed exposures—although some evidence from experimental and field studies casts doubt on this practice. The ALPNAP-study population (N = 1641) shows sufficient subgroups with combinations of rail-highway, highway-main road and rail-highway-main road sound exposure. In this paper we apply a few suggested approaches of the literature to investigate exposure-response curves and its major determinants in the case of exposure to multiple traffic sources. Highly/moderate annoyance and full scale mean annoyance served as outcome. The results show several limitations of the current approaches. Even facing the inherent methodological limitations (energy equivalent summation of sound, rating of overall annoyance) the consideration of main contextual factors jointly occurring with the sources (such as vibration, air pollution) or coping activities and judgments of the wider area soundscape increases the variance explanation from up to 8% (bivariate), up to 15% (base adjustments) up to 55% (full contextual model). The added predictors vary significantly, depending on the source combination. (e.g., significant vibration effects with main road/railway, not highway). Although no significant interactions were found, the observed additive effects are of public health importance. Especially in the case of a three source exposure situation the overall annoyance is already high at lower levels and the contribution of the acoustic indicators is small compared with the non-acoustic and contextual predictors. Noise mapping needs to go down to levels of 40 dBA,Lden to ensure the protection of quiet areas and prohibit the silent “filling up” of these areas with new sound sources. Eventually, to better predict the annoyance in the exposure range between 40 and 60 dBA and support the protection of quiet areas in city and rural areas in planning sound indicators need to be oriented at the noticeability of sound and consider other traffic related by-products (air quality, vibration, coping strain) in future studies and environmental impact assessments.
Drug Hypersensitivity and Desensitizations: Mechanisms and New Approaches
Authors: De las Vecillas Sánchez Leticia , Alenazy Leila , Garcia-Neuer Marlene , Castells Mariana
Published: June 2017

Drug hypersensitivity reactions (HSRs) are increasing in the 21st Century with the ever expanding availability of new therapeutic agents. Patients with cancer, chronic inflammatory diseases, cystic fibrosis, or diabetes can become allergic to their first line therapy after repeated exposures or through cross reactivity with environmental allergens. Avoidance of the offending allergenic drug may impact disease management, quality of life, and life expectancy. Precision medicine provides new tools for the understanding and management of hypersensitivity reactions (HSRs), as well as a personalized treatment approach for IgE (Immunoglobuline E) and non-IgE mediated HSRs with drug desensitization (DS). DS induces a temporary hyporesponsive state by incremental escalation of sub-optimal doses of the offending drug. In vitro models have shown evidence that IgE desensitization is an antigen-specific process which blocks calcium flux, impacts antigen/IgE/FcεRI complex internalization and prevents the acute and late phase reactions as well as mast cell mediator release. Through a “bench to bedside” approach, in vitro desensitization models help elucidate the molecular pathways involved in DS, providing new insights to improved desensitization protocols for all patients. The aim of this review is to summarize up to date information on the drug HSRs, the IgE mediated mechanisms of desensitization, and their clinical applications.
MinT: Middleware for Cooperative Interaction of Things
Authors: Jeon Soobin , Jung Inbum
Published: June 2017

This paper proposes an Internet of Things (IoT) middleware called Middleware for Cooperative Interaction of Things (MinT). MinT supports a fully distributed IoT environment in which IoT devices directly connect to peripheral devices easily construct a local or global network, and share their data in an energy efficient manner. MinT provides a sensor abstract layer, a system layer and an interaction layer. These enable integrated sensing device operations, efficient resource management, and active interconnection between peripheral IoT devices. In addition, MinT provides a high-level API to develop IoT devices easily for IoT device developers. We aim to enhance the energy efficiency and performance of IoT devices through the performance improvements offered by MinT resource management and request processing. The experimental results show that the average request rate increased by 25% compared to Californium, which is a middleware for efficient interaction in IoT environments with powerful performance, an average response time decrease of 90% when resource management was used, and power consumption decreased by up to 68%. Finally, the proposed platform can reduce the latency and power consumption of IoT devices.
Can Green Traffic Policies Affect Air Quality? Evidence from A Difference-in-Difference Estimation in China
Authors: Qiu Lu-Yi , He Ling-Yun
Published: June 2017

Air pollution has been a serious challenge for human sustainable development. Researches show that emissions from the transport sector have been found to be a main source of air pollution in cities. Governments have implemented numerous green traffic policies to mitigate harmful emissions. However, the problem as to whether the green traffic policies are effective, and the extent to which the policies affect air quality remain unknown. This paper is the first attempt to apply a difference-in-difference method to investigate how a specific green traffic policy (in our case, the green traffic pilot cities program) affects air quality. The estimates show that the pilot program is associated with consistent reductions in annual concentration of pollutants. In pilot cities of China, the annual concentration of SO 2 , NO 2 and PM 10 decrease by 10.71 percent, 11.26 percent and 9.85 percent, respectively, after the implementation of the green traffic pilot cities program. The results show that the green traffic pilot has a noticeable improvement on air quality of the pilot cities, implying that government intervention has a positive influence on pollution prevention in the transport sector. Moreover, the green traffic system construction can be popularized in other cities to mitigate air pollution.
Characteristics of children who do not attend their hospital appointments, and GPs’ response: a mixed methods study in primary and secondary care
Authors: French Lydia RM , Turner Katrina M , Morley Hannah , Goldsworthy Lisa , Sharp Debbie J , Hamilton-Shield Julian
Published: June 2017

Background

Children who do not attend (DNA) their hospital outpatient appointments are a concern because this potentially compromises the child’s health and incurs financial cost. Little is known about children who DNA or the views of GPs to non-attendance.

Aim

To describe the characteristics of children who DNA hospital paediatric outpatient appointments, and explore how GPs view and respond to DNAs.

Design and setting

A mixed methods study of data from all new referrals to a children’s hospital in the South West of England between 1 September and 31 October 2012.

Method

Data were extracted from patients’ hospital and GP records, and Stata was used to analyse the data quantitatively. Analysis focused on describing the characteristics of children who DNA, and the process of care that followed. Practices that had either the highest or lowest number of DNAs were purposefully sampled for GPs who had referred children to secondary care at the study hospital within the previous year. Interviews were held between May 2014 and July 2015, and were analysed thematically.

Results

Children who DNA are more likely to be from an area of greater deprivation (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] 1.02, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.00 to 1.02, P = 0.04), and with a child protection alert in their hospital notes (AOR 2.72, 95% CI = 1.26 to 5.88, P = 0.01). Non-attendance is communicated poorly to GPs, rarely coded in patients’ GP records, and few GP practices have a formal policy regarding paediatric DNAs.

Conclusion

Non-attendance at hospital outpatient appointments may indicate a child’s welfare is at risk. Communication between primary and secondary care needs to be improved, and guidelines developed to encourage GPs to monitor children who DNA.
Artificial Intelligence Review
Authors: Kilani Amal , Ben Hamida Ahmed , Hamam Habib
Published: June 2017

In this paper, we present a profound literature review of the Artificial Intelligence (AI). After defining it, we briefly cover its history and enumerate its principal fields of application. We name for example information system, commerce, image processing, human-computer interaction, data compression, robotics, route planning, etc. Moreover, the test that defines an artificially intelligent system, called The Turing test, is also defined and detailed. Afterwards, we describe some AI tools such as Fuzzy logic, genetic algorithms and swarm intelligence. Special attention will be given to neural networks and fuzzy logic. We also present the future research directions and ethics.
Board Games AI
Authors: Gonsalves Tad
Published: June 2017

The classical area of AI application is the board games. This chapter introduces the two most prominent AI approaches used in developing board game agents – the MinMax algorithm and Machine Learning and explains their usage in playing games like tic-tac-toe, checkers, othello, chess, go, etc., against human opponents. The game tree is essentially a directed graph, where the nodes represent the positions in the game and the edges the moves. Even a simple board game like tic-tac toe (noughts and crosses) has as many as 255,168 leaf nodes in the game tree. Traversing the complete game tree becomes an NP-hard problem. Alpha-beta pruning is used to estimate the short-cuts through the game tree. The board game strategy depends on the evaluation function, which is a heuristic indicating how good the player's current move is in winning the game. Machine learning algorithms try to evolve or learn the agent's game playing strategy based on the evaluation function.
Computational Intelligence Approaches to Computational Aesthetics
Authors: Lakshika Erandi , Barlow Michael
Published: June 2017

Computational aesthetics is an area of research which attempts to develop computational methods that can perform human-like aesthetic judgements. Aesthetic judgements are often subjective, as such the development of computational models of aesthetics is highly challenging. This article summarises the advancements in the area of computational aesthetics and how computational intelligence techniques are applied in art and aesthetics ranging from simple classification problems to more advanced problems such as automatic generation of art artefacts, stories and simulations. The article concludes summarising major challenges that need to be addressed, and future directions that need to be undertaken in order to make significant advancements in the area of computational aesthetics and its applications.
The Summers and Winters of Artificial Intelligence
Authors: Gonsalves Tad
Published: June 2017

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a branch of Computer Science whose aim is to make computers intelligent. These “intelligent” activities, include thinking, reasoning, receiving stimuli from the environment and responding to them, solving puzzles, speaking and understanding language, etc. It was John McCarthy who coined the word, “Artificial Intelligence” at the conference on computers in Dartmouth in 1954 indicating that its goal was to achieve a digital equivalent of human level intelligence. In 1970s, AI entered a low-productive period known as the AI winter. During this period, scientific and notably commercial activities in AI dropped dramatically. The victory of IBM's Deep Blue AI program over the reigning world chess champion in 1997 is probably hailed as the biggest achievement of AI. Yet another great AI achievement is the victory of IBM's Watson over the world Jeopardy champions in 2011. This chapter is a brief outline of how through numerous ups and downs AI has come to be where it currently is, and where we might expect it to be heading in the next couple of decades.
Big Data Analysis and Mining
Authors: Leung Carson K.-S.
Published: June 2017

As new forms of information science and technology, big data analysis and mining aims to discover implicit, previously unknown, and potentially useful information and knowledge from big databases that contain high volumes of valuable veracious data collected or generated at a high velocity from a wide variety of data sources. Among different big data mining tasks, this chapter focuses on big data analysis and mining for frequent patterns. By relying on the MapReduce programming model, researchers only need to specify the “map” and “reduce” functions to discover frequent patterns from (1) big databases of precise data in a breadth-first manner or in a depth-first manner and/or from (2) big databases of uncertain data. Such a big data analysis and mining process can be sped up. The resulting (constrained or unconstrained) frequent patterns mined from big databases provide users with new insights and a sound understanding of users' patterns. Such knowledge is useful is many real-life information science and technology applications.
Bioinformatics
Authors: Ragan Mark A.
Published: June 2017

Bioinformatics has emerged as new discipline at the interface of molecular bioscience with mathematics, computer science and information technology. Bioinformatics is driven by data arising from high-throughput technologies in molecular bioscience. To enable biological discovery, bioinformatics draws on and extends technologies for data capture, management, integration and mining, computing, and communication technology. The rise of genomics has been a key driver for bioinformatics. Genomics, however, was never an end unto itself, but rather was intended to enable the understanding of complex biological systems. Bioinformatics continues to evolve in support of its constituent domains and, increasingly, their integration into genome-scale molecular systems biology. This article presents bioinformatics first from the perspective of computer science and information technology, then from the perspective of bioscience. In practice these perspectives often merge, making bioinformatics a rich, vibrant area of multidisciplinary research and application.
GWAS as the Detective to Find Genetic Contribution in Diseases
Authors: Bhattacharya Simanti , Das Amit
Published: June 2017

Genome Wide Association Study (GWAS) is a powerful method to understand the complex association of variant in gene and disease phenotype. With the approach of GWAS the traditional 'one gene to one disease' belief has been taken to another dimension where a rather complex scenario of many possible causal agent (polymorphisms) behind disease onset is explicitly explored. it also gives the liberty to monitor the difference at each point of DNA for each individual in the sample. GWAS is powered with genome mapping projects and depends on stringent statistical analysis that detects the association of polymorphisms to disease phenotype after comparing the samples collected from afflicted and un-afflicted population. However, this method also has its own limitations. But with careful experiment design and unbiased analysis this GWAS, in near future, will become a new edge technology to decipher the disease mechanism so that effective therapeutics, tailored for specific cases can be developed.
A Framework for Exploring IT-Led Change in Morphing Organizations
Authors: Cox Sharon A.
Published: June 2017

Organizational transformation refers to changes in the way in which an organization operates. Morphing organization is a term used to reflect organizational transformation, recognizing that as an organization changes the outer face the organization displays to the world, changes are also needed to the internal structures and processes within the organization to facilitate and support the external face. IT-led change is a major driver for organizational transformation. The contribution of this chapter is the presentation of an organizational architecture as a framework to structure analysis and evaluation of the aspects of an organization that may be affected by proposed changes to IT systems in an organization. The framework offers a coherent structure in which to consider organizational transformation in response to IT-led change. The framework may also be used retrospectively to analyse how changes in IT have led to organizational transformation. The application of the organization architecture is illustrated through case study examples from UK organizations.
The Main Concepts Behind the Dematerialization of Business Processes
Authors: Ávila Liliana , Teixeira Leonor
Published: June 2017

This chapter aims to introduce the main concepts behind the dematerialization of business processes, which is a relatively new in the academic literature, although there are already empirical evidences of the benefits arising from its implementation, especially in the public sector. The dematerialization of business processes results from the intersection of three other knowledge domains - electronic document management, workflow management and reengineering of business processes -, whose interconnections will be explored along the chapter. It is also emphasized the role of Information and Communication Technologies as an important tool for any organization which intends to improve its performance through the better management of its information workflows. It is presented a comparative analysis performed for some tools available in the market (propriety and open-source solutions) in order to help organizations to understand the benefits and commitments arising from the modernization of processes. Finally, are identified some opportunities for the conduction of future research.
Big Data, Knowledge, and Business Intelligence
Authors: Erickson G. Scott , Rothberg Helen N.
Published: June 2017

Knowledge management (KM), intellectual capital (IC), and competitive intelligence are distinct yet related fields that have endured and grown over the past two decades. KM and IC have always differentiated between the terms and concepts of data, information, knowledge, and wisdom/intelligence, suggesting value only comes from the more developed end of the range (knowledge and intelligence). But the advent of big data/business analytics has created new interest in the potential of data and information, by themselves, to create competitive advantage. This new attention provides opportunities for some exchange with more established theory. Big data gives direction for reinvigorating the more mature fields, providing new sources of inputs and new potential for analysis and use. Alternatively, big data/business analytics applications will undoubtedly run into common questions from KM/IC on appropriate tools and techniques for different environments, the best methods for handling the people issues of system adoption and use, and data/intelligence security.
Business Intelligence
Authors: Herschel Richard T.
Published: June 2017

Big data is driving new forms of competition, new waves of productivity growth, innovation, and providing unique ways to interact with customers. Big data is comprised of a wealth of unstructured data that is being transmitted and captured by organizations to enhance business intelligence efforts. The forms that big data takes include text, video, voice, location data, social media, and its growth is exponential. Big data encompasses multiple dimensions, including volume, variety, velocity, veracity, variability, and complexity. Despite the opportunities that big data presents, organizations are having difficulty managing it, especially in the areas of data management and data governance. Executive involvement is critical to insuring quality data for business intelligence as well as to insure that their firms will be able to attract the necessary talent to effectively engage in BI analytics. It is recommended that management take a common sense approach to dealing with big data to insure that data-driven decision-making is not compromised.
Literature Review of Augmented Reality Application in the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Industry With Relation to Building Information
Authors: Tabrizi Aydin , Sanguinetti Paola
Published: June 2017

The rapid development and adoption of AR applications, creates numerous opportunities for integrating AR with BIM and improving conventional methods used in the fields of architecture, engineering and construction (AEC). In this paper, the current trends in the development of AR applications and the application of AR technologies in the fields of AEC are proposed. Also the relation between AR application and BIM in the AEC industry with the benefits of this integration and possible issues is discussed. The related examples of BIM+AR are described during the literature review. The authors believe the papers presented in this document, cover the latest research trends and developments in the use of AR and its' combination with BIM for AEC applications. In the future, it is expected that AR applications will be further utilized in the AEC field to enhance productivity, safety and efficiency.
Heart Sound Analysis for Blood Pressure Estimation
Authors: Guedes Rui , Carvalho Henrique Cyrne , Castro Ana
Published: June 2017

This paper aims to give a perspective on how the study of the heart sound relation with blood pressure has evolved. The use of heart sound as a surrogate of the BP has been used with more emphasis on the detection of pulmonary hypertension patients, considering the frequency content, amplitude, and split the second heart sound and its subcomponents, which arise following the closure of the corresponding heart valves. Estimation of BP using the analysis of heart sound is characterized by the simplicity of the equipment used to obtain data, which after analysis allows to achieve promising results that until now were only obtained with techniques far more complex and expensive equipment. The main objective of this article is to understand how heart sound analysis may be used to estimate blood pressure and which methods are employed to detect pulmonary hypertension.
Investigating Diachronic Variation and Change in New Varieties of English
Authors: Calabrese Rita
Published: June 2017

This contribution focuses on processes of language feature convergence which gradually lead to linguistic stabilization over time whereby specific attention will be given to the process of Englishization in the South-Asian area. The chapter outlines some basic concepts pertaining language universals, contact and change as well as descriptive approaches to world varieties of English by referring to the feature classification proposed by Meshtrie and Bhatt (2008, p. 47). Then, as an explanatory case it presents the results of a study of verb-particle constructions in a well-established variety of English, i.e. Indian English, obtained by sampling data from sources varying in time, genre and register with a special focus on the methodological procedures and the analysis tools adopted to extract specific information from the data. Finally, the implications of those findings for future research on the process of language standardization in new varieties of English will be further explored.
Negotiating Local Norms in Online Communication
Authors: White Jonathan R.
Published: June 2017

This chapter investigates norms of English usage in a community of novice students on a net-based MA programme. They communicated in academic seminars using textchat. They were found to develop their own norms for using reduced forms to speed up communication. Their teachers, who in the Vietnamese and Bangladeshi native cultures of the students should have been given great respect, did not have much influence on the norm-setting process, and even were addressed very informally in the discussions. The author argues that this is an affordance of net-based education that the discourse community sets its own norms of English usage, despite the members' lack of experience.
Architecture of an Open-Source Real-Time Distributed Cyber Physical System
Authors: Scanzio Stefano
Published: June 2017

Cyber Physical Systems are based on a number of nodes connected through a communication network, which can interact with the environment. In this chapter, a completely open-source architecture of a cyber physical system based on off-the-shelf components will be presented. Its main characteristics are high real-time capabilities and the use of both wired and IEEE 802.11 wireless technologies for communication. The Linux operating system installed on common personal computers and communication technologies derived from the IT world make the proposed architecture highly customizable, inexpensive and performing. Moreover, the presence of a time synchronization service allows the sharing of time between nodes. Specific software and techniques, some based on synchronized nodes, are used to increase determinism and reliability in both wired and wireless extensions.
Ergonomic Design of a Driver Training Simulator for Rural India
Authors: Mukhopadhyay Prabir , Vinzuda Vipul
Published: June 2017

Simulator training form an integral part of driver training in rural India. As majority of the simulators are imported from the Western World they do not mimic the actual road conditions of rural India. This often leads to mismatches in the would be drivers perception of the Indian traffic and creates problems later on in their career which is manifested in the form of increased driver errors and at times fatal road accidents. This research looked in the user interface of such simulators from and usability perspective and came up with two concepts for these drivers which closely resembles the Indian rural traffic scenario.
Forensic Investigations in Cloud Computing
Authors: Barrett Diane
Published: June 2017

Cloud computing environments adds an inherent layer of complication to a digital forensic investigation. The content of this article explores current forensic acquisition processes, why current processes need to be modified for cloud investigations, and how new methods can help in an investigation. A section will be included that provides recommendations for more accurate evidence acquisition in investigations. A final section will include recommendations for additional areas of research in the area of investigating cloud computing environments and acquiring cloud computing based evidence.
Knowledge-Based Forensic Patterns and Engineering System
Authors: Tiwari Vivek , Thakur R. S.
Published: June 2017

The primary center behind this chapter is outline a devoted framework which can store forensic digital data patterns permanently. The issues, challenges, conceptual multilayer framework for developing forensic pattern warehouse for betterment of forensic prediction and forecasting has been discussed. A sequence of phases is involved during the design processes of forensic pattern warehouse and initially, conceptual modeling is one of the significant and the initial phase of forensic pattern warehouse design, because it constructs the solid framework for the next level of phases. In view of high semantic nature, there is a need to take a different approach for forensic pattern warehouse design to accommodate flexibility, isolation, extensibility and robustness. In this way, the context oriented forensic pattern warehouse design is one of the possible ways to manage patterns in a better way. The context of underlying pattern also helps to guide the queries to give more satisfactory result.
Crisis Response and Management
Authors: Zykov Sergey V.
Published: June 2017

Information technology is critically dependent on a number of technological and human factors. Software engineering processes are multi-sided; they include customer and developer parties. Conceptual misunderstanding by either party often results in the products which do not meet customer's expectations. This misconception of the software product scope usually leads to a crisis of software product delivery. To adequately manage and efficiently respond to this crisis, the authors recommend using software engineering models, methods, techniques, practices and tools. Software engineering is a discipline which started in the 1960s as a response to the so-called “software cri-sis”; it combines technical and human-related skills. To manage the crisis, the authors suggest architecture patterns and instantiate them by implementation examples.
Information Science and Technology in Crisis Response and Management
Authors: Basham Randy
Published: June 2017

Emergent technological innovations in robotics and miniaturization of robotics, drone technologies, acoustical sensors, and others are revolutionizing the effectiveness of crisis response and management efforts, on smaller local events, and in combination, may be applied to larger disaster events such as major community or regional crises. This article will define and identify the essential component parts of effective information driven and technological based crises response and management, as well as larger systems to address disasters as crises events.
Addressing Digital Competencies, Curriculum Development, and Instructional Design in Science Teacher Education
Authors: DeCoito Isha
Published: June 2017

The author reports on a mixed-methods study focusing on teacher candidates' (TCs') digital competencies as they integrated digital literacies in a science methods course. The emphasis is on course assignments which incorporated digital literacies on a variety of levels as TCs developed a) digital case studies; b) scientific timelines; c) concept presentations; and d) science resource websites focusing on multimedia interactive activities. Results indicate that the explicit integration of digital literacies created and engaged learning communities, while improving technological and scientific literacies in a purposeful manner. Findings include enhanced technological literacy in terms of learning about technology; awareness of the process of knowledge construction; personalized learning pedagogy; and heightened self-efficacy. There was also evidence that TCs utilized digital literacies learnt in the course during their practicum.
Factors Contributing to the Effectiveness of Online Students and Instructors
Authors: Kilburn Michelle , Henckell Martha , Starrett David
Published: June 2017

Identifying the positive attributes of students and instructors in the online environment will contribute to the understanding of how we can enhance the learning experience for the student and the teaching experience for the instructor. This article will assist students and instructors in understanding the differences that may be experienced in the online environment versus the face-to-face environment and provide the opportunity to consider whether online learning and/or teaching is a “good fit” for them. Understanding why students and/or instructors might choose the online environment will also assist administrators in developing successful, quality online programs that enrich the experiences for both students and instructors.
Implementing a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) System
Authors: Skoumpopoulou Dimitra , Franklin Benjamin
Published: June 2017

CRM systems offer companies a unique ability to manage their customers more effectively. There is a wealth of benefits to CRM both internally and externally, and if used correctly they can grow a company's customer base and profits. Despite this, the implementations of these systems have a high rate of failure, with companies often spending large amounts of money without gaining anything other than an internal reporting tool. This paper looks at the reasons behind these failures, looking at previous case studies, theories and problems to decipher the main issues. The authors then use a recent CRM implementation as a case study to see how these issues relate to a real life scenario. The research concludes with a ten-step plan which can help academics and practitioners in gaining a better understanding of the implementation issues involved with such complex systems.
Piracy and Intellectual Property Theft in the Internet Era
Authors: Wang Shun-Yung Kevin , McDaniel Jeremy J
Published: June 2017

Stealing ideas is not something new, but stealing and transporting ideas in a massive amount has become possible in the era of the Internet, in which this group of incidents emerged rapidly. Based on the frameworks of criminological theory/thesis, this chapter intends to elaborate intellectual property theft and piracy emerged in the cyberspace. Contemporary cases of intellectual property theft and piracy are used to illustrate the blurred line between victims and offenders, especially in the era of Internet. The impacts of related information technology should be carefully appraised, as more and more intellectual properties are in digital format.
Secure Group Key Sharing Protocols and Cloud System
Authors: Thakare Vaishali Ravindra , K John Singh
Published: June 2017

Cloud Computing has been envisioned as the next-generation architecture of IT Enterprise. Secure and reliable communications have become critical in modern computing. The centralized services like e-mail and file sharing can be changed into distributed or collaborated system through multiple systems and networks. Basic cryptographic requirements such as data confidentiality, data integrity, authentication and access control are required to build secure collaborative system in the broadcast channel. For several groupware applications like voice & video conferences, distributed computation over the insecure network, developing an efficient group key agreement protocol for secure communication is required in internet. According to the recent rule released by Health and Human Services (HHS), healthcare data can be outsourced to cloud computing services for medical studies. The aim of this study is to provide the details about secure group data sharing protocols available and how it will be applicable in healthcare cloud applications to share data securely over healthcare cloud.