cometadata/datacite-titles-descriptions-related-identifiers huggingface dataset:
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.1
title: A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR THE RENEGOTIATION OF PPP CONTRACTS

description: Public Private Partnership (PPP) contracts tend to have longer contract durations compared to other conventional procurement methods. A contract renegotiation becomes inevitable in most of the cases. The renegotiation process usually develops a number of scenarios in order to regain the contract equilibrium. The common renegotiation scenarios used are: increasing the service charges, increasing the concession period, or paying a lump sum amount to the party of concern in order to maintain a fixed rate of return and keep the return on equity constant. In this paper, a method of selecting the optimum scenario among the different scenarios is proposed. The aim of this research is to facilitate the renegotiation process by offering an automated system to select the optimum renegotiation scenario that preserves the rights and the interests of the project stakeholders. This is done using a weighted sum model to calculate the weights and ranks of a number of factors influencing the stakeholders' decisions. A Decision Support System (DSS) is developed with the aid of Microsoft Excel 2013, Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) programming language, and the Precision Tree 5.5 for Excel add-in.
DOI: 10.25548/w-qxxc
title: In vivo replacement of damaged bladder urothelium by Wolffian duct epithelial cells

description: Figures and data relating to the PNAS 2018 paper titled "In vivo replacement of damaged bladder urothelium by Wolffian duct epithelial cells" by Vezina et al. Paper abstract: The bladders remarkable regenerative capacity had been thought to derive exclusively from its own progenitors. While examining consequences of DNA methyltransferase 1 (Dnmt1) inactivation in mouse embryonic bladder epithelium, we made the surprising discovery that Wolffian duct epithelial cells can support bladder regeneration. Conditional Dnmt1 inactivation in mouse urethral and bladder epithelium triggers widespread apoptosis, depletes basal and intermediate bladder cells and disrupts Uroplakin protein expression. These events coincide with Wolffian duct epithelial cell recruitment into Dnmt1 mutant urethra and bladder where they are reprogrammed to express bladder markers including FOXA1, Keratin 5, P63 and Uroplakin. This is the first evidence that Wolffian duct epithelial cells are summoned in vivo to replace damaged bladder epithelium and function as a reservoir of cells for bladder regeneration.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.10
title: ASSESSMENT OF CONTRACTORS' PRACTICES TOWARDS RISKS OUT OF CONTRACTORS CONTROL IN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

description: Research has shown that public construction projects in Saudi Arabia have exhibited poor performance for the past three decades. Recent studies have identified the ownership of parties who cause risks and lead to low performance in the Saudi construction industry. These studies identified that contractors are not the main party that cause risks as owners, consultants, and other parties have the major share of causing risks in the industry. The aim of this study is to assess the current risk management and performance measurement practices applied by contractors to minimize risk out of their control (caused by other parties) through conducting a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire survey was sent to contractors who work in public construction projects in Saudi Arabia. The assessment included the contractors' practices in the identification of projects activities and risks, contractors' practices in mitigating other parties' activities and risks, and contractors' practices in measuring the performance of all project parties. The study identified that contractors' current risk management and performance measurement practices are not effective in minimizing projects risks caused by other parties and ineffective in measuring performance of all parties. The study recommends a proactive risk management approach that can help contractors to minimize risks caused by other parties and can measure the performance of all parties in projects.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.2
title: A SIMPLIFIED METHOD FOR PHYSICAL PROGRESS MEASUREMENT

description: Project stakeholders frequently have problems while monitoring the progress of the projects during execution. Since an unbiased measurement system could not be established, progress figures are mainly based on project stakeholders' own experiences or subjective judgements. Considering the size of the projects, small to medium scale projects suffer the most from this problem. Usually, planning and site organizations of such scale projects are not set up adequately due to tight budgets or limited number of qualified personnel. Therefore, progress calculation method could not be defined efficiently or the data required for calculating project progress could not be gathered accurately. In order to overcome aforementioned difficulties and measure the progress correctly, simplified progress measurement techniques can be a solution. This article intends to describe how a simplified and convenient physical progress measurement method can be established. By separating the project into main elements and defining the most indicative commodities of them, number of parameters, which should be followed in the project can be decreased to a manageable level. Project weights of the elements can be calculated by taking into account standard man-hours required to complete each of them. Finally, construction milestones of the elements can be scheduled in a table, which helps to track and calculate the progress. A footbridge example is simply illustrated in the article to describe the method to readers explicitly.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.3
title: A SYSTEM-OF-SYSTEMS FRAMEWORK FOR PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP PROJECTS

description: Public-private partnership projects are a complex form of megaprojects since they include a close-knit long-term contractual relationship between a public and private entity. Studying a PPP project as a monolithic system often leads to disregarding the emergent properties that occur from the interdependency between the subsystems. Hence there is a need for providing a framework for analyzing PPPs using the systems engineering approach. This paper proposes the adoption of a System-of-Systems (SoS) approach to analyzing PPP projects and proposes a framework for it. A top-down approach is used to identify the key components and their interrelationships. The analysis presented in this paper reveals the SoS taxonomy and lexicon for a PPP project and the hierarchical levels under it. The findings provide a step towards effectively analyzing the relationship within and across the various systems. They are expected to assist researchers in understanding and simulating the dynamics between the different subsystems.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.4
title: ADMINISTERING CONDITION PRECEDENT NOTICES IN CONSTRUCTION CONTRACTS

description: Notices represent a main area of concern for engineering and architecture professionals involved in construction contract administration, as the failure to satisfy their requirements can jeopardize the concerned party's performance under the contract. This is specifically true of those notices that are stated or inferred to be condition precedent to the preservation or the establishment of the rights of either party. A screening of all instances stipulating the issuance of notices under the standard conditions for the construction contract issued by the International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) revealed that 41 out of the 93 encountered instances require condition-precedent notices to be issued for preserving or establishing relevant rights. This paper presents a detailed analysis of the three classes that were found to encompass these notices. As such, it sheds light on the distribution of the responsibilities for issuing them between the contractor, on one hand, and the owner or the Engineer on his behalf, on the other hand. It further discusses possible compositions of their structures, highlighting the time bars as well as the prerequisite events that are likely to be involved. The merit of the work lies in mapping these notices, with the aim of helping contract administration practitioners properly deal with them such that the contractual risks associated with their requirements can be avoided.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.5
title: ADMINISTRATING THE CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT "OR" MANAGING THE RELATIONSHIP?

description: The construction contract conditions shall ideally be drafted in such a manner that provides for a balanced allocation of risks between the parties to any such contract. The project management teams, inclusive of contract administration professionals forming part of such teams, are then faced with decisions that are to be made on day-to-day basis in respect of observing the called-for contractual requirements. Those decisions pertaining to the initiation of claims and contributing to their progression are of the most difficult to administer and put in place, owing to such actions being at times viewed as detrimental to the relationship between the parties, both at the project operational as well as the corporate levels. This paper discusses the factors that come into play when such critical decisions get to be evaluated. As such, it presents a holistic perspective of the kinds of pressure expected to be prevailing over the involved decision-making process. The argued considerations are informed by a number of practical dispute resolution cases and the scenarios that have emanated under them. The paper concludes by providing guidelines that can help draw the line between the necessity of acting in fulfillment of the concerned contract callings and the process of preserving the relationship between the parties to the contract.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.6
title: ALTERNATIVE MEDIATION OPERABILITY MECHANISMS UNDER STANDARD CONSTRUCTION CONTRACT CONDITIONS

description: The use of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) techniques has been on the rise, particularly as part of the contemporary, staged-type mechanisms forming part of the pertinent conditions of the construction contract. Among the several ADR methods in use, mediation is the method widely found to be explicitly or implicitly incorporated in any such mechanisms, with its use being often stipulated as condition precedent to ultimately resorting to arbitration. This paper investigates the varying statuses of mediation as prescribed under three American-based standard contract conditions, in comparison with its implied status under international such conditions. The within and in-between comparative analyses revealed distinct differences and some resemblances in respect of several concerned attributes including: (1) the staging (sequence step) of the mediation process within the involved claim/dispute resolution timelines, (2) the condition(s) for triggering such a process, (3) the provisions governing its length, and (4) the manner with which it may be ended. The paper concludes with inferences as to the characteristics that may be hypothetically viewed as more conducive to the effective employment of such an ADR technique in resolving disputes.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.7
title: AN EFFECTIVE TECHNIQUE UTILIZING FRCM SYSTEM IN STRENGTHENING RC BEAMS IN SHEAR

description: This paper presents the efficacy of a new technique of fabric reinforced cementitious matrix (FRCM) for the strengthening of shear deficient reinforced concrete (RC) beams.  This technique involves embedding the FRCM composites in the concrete cover and is referred to as "near surface embedded" FRCM (NSE-FRCM) technique.  Five (5) medium scale rectangular RC beams of width ื depth ื length of 150 ื 330 ื 2100 mm were constructed and tested under displacement controlled with three-point loading.  One beam was kept unstrengthen as a control specimen whereas the other four beams were strengthened with different types and configurations of the NSE-FRCM system.  The test parameters were:  (a) geometric configuration (intermittent strips of NSE-FRCM versus full NSE-FRCM plate), and (b) fabric types (carbon versus glass fabrics).  The test results indicated that the NSE-FRCM technique can successfully be used to significantly enhance the shear capacity of the strengthened beams.  The strengthened specimens exhibited an average enhancement in the shear capacity of 62% over the unstrengthen beam.  The full NSE-FRCM plate showed higher enhancement in the shear strength compared to that for the intermittent NSE-FRCM configuration.  Moreover, the specimens strengthened with carbon FRCM showed higher shear capacity compared to that with glass FRCM counterparts.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.8
title: AN INVESTIGATION INTO CRANE AND SCAFFOLD SAFETY IN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

description: The aim of this study is to determine whether construction sites involving cranes and scaffold in Australian large construction sites have been in compliance with the existing Work Health and Safety (WHS) requirements. The research comprises three case studies which investigated the causes of crane and scaffold safety incidents that occurred in New South Wales. The results of the case study on a number of separate sites in Sydney, NSW have shown that without stringent safety procedures in place to abide by the WHS Act and Regulations, major accidents can occur and can cause serious injury and could cause potential fatalities while working with cranes and scaffold. Results also found that a number of limiting factors including communication skill, regular maintenance, safety checks, safety culture and safety investments could contribute to the severity of the incidents.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.9
title: ARCHITECTURAL ENGINEERING IN REHABILITATION AT SOCIAL HOUSING QUARTERS

description: The rehabilitation of social housing quarters is done with the purpose to answer three central questions: (1) to solve the existing anomalies that are often caused by rain water infiltrations through the vertical's building envelope and also through roof, condensation caused by the lack of insulation and poor existent ventilation and existing cracks in building's facades
description: (2) to improve thermal comfort and increase energy efficiency of the buildings
description: (3) to increase the satisfaction and self-esteem of the residents promoting a modern and also high quality architectural intervention at social housing quarters. This study will describe the executed solutions for the rehabilitation of this three social housing quarters, three of the biggest social quarters of the Oporto region, each one with a different intervention in the building envelope.
DOI: 10.15129/b0e880c0-d109-4724-9e3f-00b3225bc81f
title: Mechanical Testing Data

description: Mechanical testing data for tensile tests in the direction of the fibre for uni-directional CFRP. Both virgin and rf-CFRP tests were undertaken. 

Data emabrgo 01/11/2018
DOI: 10.15482/usda.adc/1439438
title: Anoplophora glabripennis genome annotations v0.5.3
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.1256168
title: Scid Multiomics Post-Processed Data And Analysis

description: In this repository are the post-processed datasets and analytical code for the SCID Multiomics paper. The repository is structured as an installable R package for dependency management and dataset loading; it does not export any functions.

<strong>Installation</strong>

The easiest way to install this is to download the repository and install using `devtools::install()`. This will allow the import of various datasets using the `data()` function, upon which many of the analysis scripts depend.

<strong>Datasets</strong>

In no particular order, the important datasets are described below:

- <strong>intsites</strong>: summary statistics from (Wang et al, Blood, 2010) for timepoints used in this study<br>
- <strong>tcr</strong>: Aggregate TCR data from Adaptive Biotechnology's ImmunoSeq pipeline.<br>
- <strong>mb</strong>: Metadata for the microbiome sampling timepoints, as well as species data from Metaphlan (not used)<br>
- <strong>agg.mb.kz</strong>: Kraken species data for the microbiome samples, after low-complexity filtering<br>
- <strong>agg.vp.kz</strong>: Kraken species data for the virome samples, after low-complexity filtering<br>
- <strong>card</strong>: Antibiotic resistance gene data from CARD<br>
- <strong>subject_ids.csv</strong>: Provides a mapping from the original sample IDs used in the datasets to the ones used in the manuscript.

The code for creating these datasets from the original data files are in the `data-raw` directory.

<strong>Analysis/Figures</strong>

The analysis code is broken apart by subject and is largely concerned with figure generation. The R<br>
scripts are all located in the `inst` folder. To generate all figures, you should run each script in the<br>
order specified by the `GenerateFigures.R` file.

Figures are output to the `figures` directory, while tables are output to the `tables` directory.

Please note: many of the figures used in the manuscript were aesthetically modified after generation (text size, color palette, orientation), precluding exact figure replication
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.1256169
title: Scid Multiomics Post-Processed Data And Analysis

description: In this repository are the post-processed datasets and analytical code for the SCID Multiomics paper. The repository is structured as an installable R package for dependency management and dataset loading; it does not export any functions.

<strong>Installation</strong>

The easiest way to install this is to download the repository and install using `devtools::install()`. This will allow the import of various datasets using the `data()` function, upon which many of the analysis scripts depend.

<strong>Datasets</strong>

In no particular order, the important datasets are described below:

- <strong>intsites</strong>: summary statistics from (Wang et al, Blood, 2010) for timepoints used in this study<br>
- <strong>tcr</strong>: Aggregate TCR data from Adaptive Biotechnology's ImmunoSeq pipeline.<br>
- <strong>mb</strong>: Metadata for the microbiome sampling timepoints, as well as species data from Metaphlan (not used)<br>
- <strong>agg.mb.kz</strong>: Kraken species data for the microbiome samples, after low-complexity filtering<br>
- <strong>agg.vp.kz</strong>: Kraken species data for the virome samples, after low-complexity filtering<br>
- <strong>card</strong>: Antibiotic resistance gene data from CARD<br>
- <strong>subject_ids.csv</strong>: Provides a mapping from the original sample IDs used in the datasets to the ones used in the manuscript.

The code for creating these datasets from the original data files are in the `data-raw` directory.

<strong>Analysis/Figures</strong>

The analysis code is broken apart by subject and is largely concerned with figure generation. The R<br>
scripts are all located in the `inst` folder. To generate all figures, you should run each script in the<br>
order specified by the `GenerateFigures.R` file.

Figures are output to the `figures` directory, while tables are output to the `tables` directory.

Please note: many of the figures used in the manuscript were aesthetically modified after generation (text size, color palette, orientation), precluding exact figure replication
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.11
title: BEHAVIOR OF FULLY ENCASED COLD FORMED STEEL JOISTS WITH/WITHOUT WEB OPENINGS: EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION

description: This paper presents an experimental investigation on the behavior of encased light cold-formed steel joists with/without web openings. The study is carried on two sets of composite beams constructed of cold-formed steel joists using I-beam built-up sections. The first set has no web openings while the second set has circular web openings. Each set consists of three beams with various steel section-concrete reinforcing ratio. The constant parameters included in this study are the cross sectional area of the specimen, distribution of web openings in the encased steel I- joist, and the compressive strength of concrete. The tests have been conducted by applying two concentrated identical loads. Consequently, a comparative study is carried out to compare between the behavior of specimens within one set, and a comparison between the specimens of the two sets. This comparison is related to strength, stiffness, ductility, energy absorption capacity and failure modes. Based on the testing results, it is concluded that, the load capacity of the composite beams without web openings is greater than that with web openings for the same steel ratio. But the existence of web openings in the encased steel joists enhances the ductility and the energy absorption of the composite beams. Also using cold formed steel I-joists in the composite beams allow the failure mode to be ductile flexural failure.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.12
title: BENEFITS OF REMANUFACTURING THE ECONOMY AS A TRANSITION INTO A GREEN ECONOMY

description: Remanufacturing is the restoration of end of life products to almost new. It is a form of sustainability. The research set out to identify the benefits of remanufacturing to the Nigerian economy which could aid with the transition to green economy. A questionnaire survey was used to establish the benefits of remanufacturing to the Nigerian economy. Data analysis involving mean item score revealed development of an Industrial base, industrialisation to rural areas, boosting of export trade, conservation of natural resources are seen as important benefits of remanufacturing to the Nigerian economy. Factor analysis made known four clusters titled in the order of importance as benefits of remanufacturing environmentally, benefits of remanufacturing to trade, benefits of remanufacturing socially, benefits of remanufacturing to entrepreneurs as this clusters signify the benefits of remanufacturing to the Nigerian economy. Further discussed is the implication of the findings, firstly is the development of an industrial base, which will benefit Nigeria, as Nigeria is an under-industrialised nation. Furthermore, the entrenchment of the development of an industrial base would lead to a boosting of export trade in the form of exporting capital equipment to other countries as well as an inflow of foreign exchange. Lastly revealed is the industrialisation to the rural areas, which will stop the social scourge of rural and urban migration.
DOI: 10.14455/isec.res.2018.13
title: CASE STUDY OF SEISMIC EVALUATION AND STRENGTHENING OF EXISTING LOW-RISE REINFORCED CONCRETE BUILDING

description: All new buildings nowadays have to be designed and executed to overcome any imposed type of loading (lateral/vertical). On a universal scale, the stock of buildings built before 1980's is believed to be many times more than the number of newer buildings in most urban cities. In Beirut, as an example, a large proportion of Reinforced Concrete (RC) structures were constructed in the absence of mandatory earthquake design requirements, and unquestionably recognized as the type of construction most vulnerable to earthquakes. The performed research focused on how to evaluate the status of old building and how to design and execute the convenient seismic strengthening schemes. A case study has been selected to implement the evaluation process and design proposals. Conventional seismic upgrading technique has been assessed like the addition of shear walls in addition to more innovative approach which is the installation of steel bracing system. The strengthening schemes proposed aimed to create an ideal harmonization of the technical, economic and social aspects of the issue in hand. Analysis of the three structural systems (existing, modified with shear walls and with bracing systems) has been performed using the ETABS software including static equivalent, dynamic and pushover analyses. The research sorted out with a comparison between the systems based on different structural criteria followed by general recommendations and suggestions.