bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Polyhedral Finite Elements Using Harmonic Basis Functions
Authors: Martin Sebastian , Kaufmann Peter , Botsch Mario , Wicke Martin , Gross Markus 
Published: September 2008

AbstractFinite element simulations in computer graphics are typically based on tetrahedral or hexahedral elements, which enables simple and efficient implementations, but in turn requires complicated remeshing in case of topological changes or adaptive refinement. We propose a flexible finite element method for arbitrary polyhedral elements, thereby effectively avoiding the need for remeshing. Our polyhedral finite elements are based on harmonic basis functions, which satisfy all necessary conditions for FEM simulations and seamlessly generalize both linear tetrahedral and trilinear hexahedral elements. We discretize harmonic basis functions using the method of fundamental solutions, which enables their flexible computation and efficient evaluation. The versatility of our approach is demonstrated on cutting and adaptive refinement within a simulation framework for corotated linear elasticity.
Institutions and Voluntary Compliance: The Disclosure of Individual Executive Pay in Germany
Authors: Chizema Amon 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTManuscript Type: EmpiricalResearch Question/Issue: This study seeks to understand why the disclosure of individual executive compensation, as recommended by the German Code of Corporate Governance, met with resistance in some firms while being a welcome innovation for others. Employing the theoretical perspective of institutional inertia and change, this paper identifies the characteristics of a firm likely to embrace or resist a management practice imported from an Anglo‐American system of corporate governance.Research Findings/Results: Using data on large German firms for the years 2002 through 2005, the study shows that institutional ownership, dispersed ownership, state ownership, prior adoption of shareholder value‐oriented practices, and firm size are positively and significantly associated with the disclosure of individual executive compensation. On the other hand, the size of the supervisory board and firm age are negatively and significantly associated with individual disclosure of executive compensation.Theoretical Implications: This study provides empirical support for the institutional inertia or change perspective at the national level for the adoption of contested management practices, taken from the Anglo‐American system and translated to the German model. As such, it adds to the argument on convergence/divergence in comparative corporate governance literature, as well as support for the neo‐institutional perspective in helping to further understand institutional change.Practical Implications: This study offers insights to policy makers who aim to create an institutional environment that accepts corporate governance practices translated or negotiated from a different variety of capitalism. In addition, it provides a useful synthesis of the relevance and effectiveness of codes of corporate governance, thus helping policy makers to recommend continuation with the current elements of the code or to make such provisions compulsory.
Toward a Social Capital Theory of Director Selection
Authors: Kim Yangmin , Cannella Albert A. 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTManuscript Type: ConceptualResearch Question/Issue: Our study evaluates the role of social capital in new director selection, board composition, and board effectiveness.Research Findings/Insights: We take steps toward a theory of director selection, explaining how social capital at the individual‐level influences director selection and at the group level influences board effectiveness. At the individual level, social capital is defined as the interpersonal linkages that director candidates have to others, both inside and outside the firm. At the group level, board social capital is an asset that includes both relations of directors and potential resources arising from the relations.Theoretical/Academic Implications: We argue that: 1) social capital can be divided into internal and external dimensions according to its locus and function; 2) both internal and external social capital are associated with board composition through director selection, although the causal logic differs considerably; 3) the influences of social capital on director selection vary according to the context; and 4) both internal social capital and external social capital generate unique resources that are important to board effectiveness.Practitioner/Policy Implications: Our study informs practicing managers, because we describe how and why most research and public discussion has emphasized the role of directors as monitors of managers and this has significantly downplayed the role of directors in providing advice, counsel, and other resources to their organizations. We provide a strong logic for seeking directors with specific types of social capital (internal or external) under specific contexts.
Understanding Consumer Rationalities: Consumer Involvement in European Food Safety Governance of Avian Influenza
Authors: De Krom Michiel P.M.M. 
Published: September 2008

AbstractAvian influenza is one more of the recent food scares inciting shifts in European food safety governance, away from a predominantly science‐based approach towards one involving scientists, policymakers, actors in the food‐supply chain and consumers. While these shifts are increasingly receiving scholarly attention, sociological insight into the involvement of consumers and other actors across the multiple levels of today's food safety governance requires further development. This article aims at contributing to the understanding of consumer perspectives on food safety governance by expounding the results of an explorative research among Dutch consumers, which focused on food risks related to avian influenza. To give ample room for the construction of contextual knowledge, consumers of poultry meat were questioned at various retailers by applying a qualitative interviewing method. From this research, it is concluded that multiple consumer rationalities about food safety governance exist. As a consequence of the existence of these multiple consumer rationalities, a differentiated governance approach to restore or retain consumer confidence in food safety in view of food‐related risks is more likely to be pertinent than a ‘one‐size‐fits‐all’ approach.
Reasons for the Relatively Lower Entrepreneurial Activity Levels of Rural Women in Spain
Authors: Driga Otilia , Lafuente Esteban , Vaillant Yancy 
Published: September 2008

AbstractThis study examines the impact that selected institutional factors have upon the entrepreneurial activity of women and men in rural areas. To do so, the results of the Adult Population Survey from the Spanish Global Entrepreneurship Monitor for the year 2004 have been used in a rare events logit regression model where rurality and sex have been introduced as interaction terms in order to identify any statistically significant distinctions of the impact of the selected independent variables upon rural women's entrepreneurial activity. The results indicate that compared to rural men, Spanish rural women tend to be less involved in entrepreneurial activities and are less optimistic about their abilities as entrepreneurs, although the fear of failure is not a significant impediment of their involvement in entrepreneurship.
Causes of death amongst French patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a prospective study
Authors: Gil J. , Funalot B. , Verschueren A. , Danel‐Brunaud V. , Camu W. , Vandenberghe N. , Desnuelle C. , Guy N. , Camdessanche J. P. , Cintas P. , Carluer L. , Pittion S. , Nicolas G. , Corcia P. , Fleury M.‐C. , Maugras C. , Besson G. , Le Masson G. , Couratier P. 
Published: September 2008

Background and purpose:  To prospectively investigate causes of death and the circumstances surrounding death in 302 patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The functional status of patients immediately before death was also determined.Methods:  Information was obtained from neurologists at ALS centres, patients’ files, and, when deaths occurred outside a medical facility, attending physicians.Results:  Most patients (63%) died in a medical facility. The most frequently reported cause of death was respiratory failure (77%), including terminal respiratory insufficiency (58%), pneumonia (14%), asphyxia due to a foreign body (3%) and pulmonary embolism (2%). Ten per cent of patients died from other causes: post‐surgical or traumatic conditions (5%), cardiac causes (3.4%), suicide (1.3%) and sudden death of unknown origin (0.7%). The cause of death could not be determined in 13% of cases (6% inside a medical facility and 25% outside). At the time of death, only 55% of patients were receiving riluzole, 33% were undergoing non‐invasive ventilation, 3% had a tracheotomy and 37% a gastrostomy.Conclusion:  The information provided by this study helps to improve our understanding of the natural history of the disease and may help optimize the quality of care we can offer patients at the end of life.
Tensions in Higher Education Leadership: Towards a Multi‐Level Model of Leadership Practice
Authors: Bolden Richard , Petrov Georgy , Gosling Jonathan 
Published: September 2008

AbstractUK higher education is undergoing a period of significant change that generates a series of tensions and difficulties for universities and university leaders. This paper explores these tensions through analysis of findings from a study comprising 152 semi‐structured face‐to‐face interviews in 12 UK universities. Building on from theories of ‘distributed leadership’ in schools, five main constituent elements of leadership practice in higher education are identified (personal, social, structural, contextual and developmental) and explored to show how they shape perceptions and experiences of leadership. The paper concludes with a refined model that teases apart the multilayered nature of higher education leadership at individual, group and organisational levels. In particular, it is argued that ‘social capital’ and ‘social identity’ act as important bridges between individual agency and organisational structure and that although widely distributed, higher education leadership may be best regarded as ‘hybrid’.
CHOOSING NOT TO LOOK: REPRESENTATION, REPATRIATION, AND HOLOCAUST ATROCITY PHOTOGRAPHY1
Authors: CRANE SUSAN A. 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTThis essay considers, from ethical and historical‐critical perspectives, alternatives to unconditional public access to Holocaust atrocity photographs. Photographic images have become the common coin of public awareness and historical information about the Holocaust. For the generations immediately following the genocide, atrocity photos and images of Nazi crimes served as vital testimony. For succeeding generations, however, access to certain “recirculated” images (Barbie Zelizer) has created a sense of familiarity with the Holocaust and with the National Socialist era that may prevent, rather than facilitate, engagement with the historical subject, particularly for students. Few of the victims of the Shoah pictured in either the best known or the least circulated images were willing subjects. As such, the bulk of Holocaust and National Socialist photography should perhaps fall under the same category as the results of Nazi medical experiments: they have been rendered inadmissible because they are ethically compromised materials, made without the participants’consent. While I am not advocating the wholesale destruction of Holocaust photographs, I will suggest that removing them from view or “repatriating” them might serve Holocaust memory better than their reduction to atrocious objects of banal attention. Just as the Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 provided a mechanism for the reclassification of human remains, from ethnographic to spiritually sacred artifacts, we should consider what a similar reclassification of Holocaust photographs could offer. Have Holocaust atrocity photographs reached the limits of their usefulness as testimony?
Double‐Counting in Life Cycle Calculations
Authors: Lenzen Manfred 
Published: September 2008

SummaryMany popular frameworks apply life cycle calculations to examine environmental burdens occurring throughout the life cycle of products and services that are either purchased by final consumers or demanded as inputs by producers. Accounting for the full supply chain of producer items can lead to double‐counting effects when results of separate studies are added up and referenced or compared to totals. If, for instance, energy life cycle inventories were prepared for all consumer and producer items in an economy and added up, the resulting total amount of energy would be greater than national energy consumption. Although this double‐counting is inconsequential if analyses are appraised in isolation without reference to national totals, it leads to serious errors when large interconnected systems are analyzed or when results are placed into wider (e.g., regional, national, or global) contexts. The article lists a number of prominent policy and decision‐making frameworks that make use of life cycle techniques, where this double‐counting error is highly undesirable. It proposes a solution to the double‐counting problem in which supply chains in the product life cycle are split and burdens shared between the supplying and demanding sides of every transaction in the economy.
Prospective Evaluation of Topical Antibiotics for Preventing Infections in Uncomplicated Soft‐tissue Wounds Repaired in the ED
Authors: Dire Daniel J. , Coppola Marco , Dwyer David A. , Lorette John J. , Karr Jerry L. 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective: To determine differences in infection rates among uncomplicated, repaired wounds managed with: topical bacitracin zinc (BAC); neomycin sulfate, bacitracin zinc, and polymyxin B sulfate combination (NEO); silver sulfadiazine (SIL); and petrolatum (PTR).Methods: This was a prospective, randomized, double‐blind, placebo‐controlled study conducted at a military community hospital with an emergency medicine residency program. Patients were enrolled if they: presented to the ED within 12 hours of injury and did not have puncture wounds, allergies to the agents used, or a history of immunocompromise; were not receiving antibiotics, chemotherapy, or steroids at the time of presentation; had not taken antibiotics within the preceding seven days; did not have an underlying fracture; and were not pregnant as determined by history. Local anesthetics without epinephrine and high‐pressure irrigation with normal saline were used for all the patients. Wound scrubbing, debridement, and polyglactin subcutaneous (SQ) suture placement were carried out when necessary. Interrupted simple sutures using a monofilament, nonabsorbable material were used for skin closure. Numbered, randomized vials were given to all patients, with standardized instructions to inspect, clean, and redress their wounds three times a day. The wounds were evaluated for clinical infection at the time of follow‐up.Results: Among the groups, there was no difference in patient ages; gender; wound location, type, length, or depth; time elapsed from injury to ED treatment; number of wounds scrubbed or necessitating debridement; number of SQ and cutaneous sutures used; and rate of compliance with returning the used vial of dispensed topical agent. The wound infection rates for the treatment groups were: BAC, six of 109 (5.5%); NEO, five of 110 (4.5%); SIL, 12 of 99 (12.1%); and PTR, 19 of 108 (17.6%) (p = 0.0034).Conclusion: The use of topical antibiotics resulted in significantly lower infection rates than did the use of a petrolatum control. BAC and NEO had the lowest wound infection rates.
Demographics of Cardiac Arrest: Association with Residence in a Low‐income Area
Authors: Feero Stan , Hedges Jerris R. , Stevens Penny 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective: To report cardiac arrest demographics and assess whether arrest rate is associated with differences in intracity regional population densities, incomes, or race distributions.Methods: One‐year retrospective review of out‐of‐hospital cardiac arrests in a city with a two‐tier emergency medical service (EMS) system. Associations of population density, median income, and race data with age‐ and gender‐adjusted cardiac arrest rates for seven city regions and groupings of high‐ and low‐income census tracts were made.Results: Median income, but not race or population density, was associated with sex‐ and age‐adjusted intracity regional cardiac arrest rates (p = 0.034). This association of cardiac arrest rate with income status was magnified when the 20 lowest and the 20 highest income census tracts were compared. Cardiac arrest victims in these two income groups did not differ in regard to rate of witnessed arrest, bystander‐administered CPR, or previous cardiac disease. Rates of survival to hospital discharge were not significantly different between the two groups.Conclusion: The association of lower income with cardiac arrest suggests that cardiac health promotion and EMS intervention measures, including CPR instruction, should be targeted to lower‐income neighborhoods. These findings may help explain previous studies suggesting a racial or population density association with cardiac arrest rates.
Cerumen Occlusion Lowers Infrared Tympanic Membrane Temperature Measurement
Authors: Doezema David , Lunt Margaret , Tandberg Dan 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective: To examine the effect that cerumen occlusion of the ear canal has on infrared tympanic membrane temperature measurement.Methods: A prospective, randomized, single‐blind human study was carried out in a university hospital observation unit. The subjects were a convenience sample of human volunteers aged 18 years or older who did not have cerumen occlusion or scarred tympanic membranes. A paraffin‐coated human cerumen plug was placed in one randomly chosen ear, and after 20 minutes of equilibration the temperature in each ear was measured with an infrared thermometer. Analysis of the difference in mean temperature between the occluded and nonoccluded ears was by Student's paired t‐test.Results: Infrared tympanic membrane temperatures were measured in 43 subjects aged 21 to 58 years. The mean temperature of the occluded ear canal was 0.3°C lower than that of the opposite ear canal (p = 0.0001, 95% CI 0.16–0.45°C).Conclusion: Cerumen occlusion of the ear canal causes underestimation of body temperature measured by infrared tympanic membrane thermometry.
Characteristics of Emergency Medicine Resident Orientation Programs
Authors: Brillman Judith C. , Sklar David P. , Viccellio Peter 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective: To determine the prevalence, duration, composition, and goals of emergency medicine resident orientation programs.Methods: Eleven‐item, descriptive mail surveys were sent by the education committee of SAEM to the program directors of all emergency medicine residency programs approved by the RRC as of January 1992.Results: Sixty‐nine of 86 survey instruments (80%) were returned. Orientation programs were offered in 64 residencies, 41 PGY1–3 programs, five PGY1–4 programs, and 18 PGY2–4 programs. Results are tabulated below.
Infiltration Pain and Local Anesthetic Effects of Buffered vs Plain 1% Diphenhydramine
Authors: Singer Adam J. , Hollander Judd E. 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective:To compare the levels of infiltration pain and local anesthetic effects of plain and buffered 1% diphenhydramine.Methods:A prospective, randomized. double‐blind, paired study was performed using 30 adult volunteers. Intradermal injections (0.5 mL) of plain and buffered 1% diphenhydramine were made in the subjects' forearms. one in the left and the other in the right. The pain of infiltration was recorded on a previously validated 10‐cm visual analog scale (VAS). The volunteers also were asked which injection was less painful. Sequential measurements of the diameter of anesthesia to pinprick were made at 1, 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 minutes. The VAS scores and anesthetic diameters were compared for plain and buffered diphenhydramine using a paired Wilcoxon rank sum test.Results:There was no statistically significant difference between buffered diphenhydramine and plain diphenhydramine for pain of injection (23.5 ± 19.2 mm vs 28.2 ± 18.7 mm. p = 0.24). Repeated‐measures analysis of variance for anesthetic diameters demonstrated no significant difference between buffered diphenhydramine and plain diphenhydramine (p = 0.87). At no single measurement period were the anesthetic diameters different.Conclusions:In a study with a sample size large enough to detect an 11‐mm difference in VAS scores (power = 80%,), no difference was found in pain of infiltration and anesthetic effects when plain 1% diphenhydramine was compared with buffered 1% diphenhydramine. Buffering of diphenhydramine does not appear to result in a clinically significant reduction in the pain of infiltration.
Right Lung Ventilation in a Porcine Open‐chest Shock Model
Authors: Ilkhanipour Kaveh , Seaberg David C. , Stengel Churles L. , Kapsner Christopher E. , Menegazzi James J. 
Published: September 2008

ABSTRACTObjective: To determine the effect of selective right lung ventilation on gas exchange and hemodynarnics when compared with bilateral lung ventilation in a porcine open‐chest shock model.Methods: 4 randomized, controlled laboratory investigation was performed using a static hemorrhagic shock model in 12 adult swine undergoing thoracotomy. The animals were subjected to a fixed 40% circulating blood volume hemorrhage over 20 minutes. Each animal was then assigned to either a tracheal (control) or a right mainstem (experimental) intubation group. Minute ventilation was held constant in both groups and tidal volumes were decreased by 33% in the right mainstem intubation group. Following intubation and left lateral thoracotomy. another 20% fixed‐volume hemorrhage was instituted simultaneously with IV crystalloid and whole blood resuscitation for both groups over 30 minutes. Heart rate. blood pressure. and arterial blood gases were measured at 5‐minute intervals.Results: There was no significant difference between the control and experimental groups for any of the measured variables. including mean arterial pressure, pH, partial arterial pressure of CO2 (Paco2), and Pao2. over time. All animals survived the study protocol.Conclusion: Selective right lung ventilation has no detrimental effect on gas exchange or hemodynarnics when compared with standard bilateral lung ventilation in a porcine open‐chest shock model.