Search results for: systems engineering management

Authors: Eric Spruth, Lindsey Herbert, Danielle DiCristofano, Isis Violet Spruth, Drake Von Spruth

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Turning dreams into reality, the lifelong passion of Mr. Spruth and the company is to transform garbage-filled courtyards into flourishing flower and vegetable gardens, bringing light, hope, and wellness to not just the space but to the populations served within these public and private spaces. As an Expressive Art Therapist at Cook County Jail, Eric Spruth has implemented gardening projects, mobile radish carts, plant fostering systems, and large-scale murals. Lindsey Herbert, the Manager of Operations and Events at the International Museum of Surgical Science, supports gardening projects with Mr. Spruth along the front lawn of the museum, which will eventually accumulate into a community wellness garden. Mr. Spruth and Ms. Herbert both have dedicated efforts towards fostering awareness of hope and help and accountability for physical and mental wellbeing. Medicinal plants can rightfully be called one of nature’s wonderful healing tools with therapeutic powers. They can inhibit and kill bacteria, lower blood pressure, blood cholesterol, and blood sugar, prevent blood clotting, boost the immune system, and serve as a digestive aid. Some plants have the ability to stimulate the lymphatic system, which expedites the removal of waste products from the body to fight off evil toxins. Many plants are considered effective antioxidants to protect cells against free radical damage, serving to prevent some forms of cancer, heart disease, strokes, and viral infections. Garlic alone can provide us with over two hundred unusual chemicals that have the capability of protecting the human body from a wide variety of diseases. Besides the medicinal qualities of plants, plant and vegetable gardens also have an echoing effect on non-participants to look at something beautiful rather than a concrete courtyard or an unkempt lawn in front of a beautiful building. Plants also purify spaces and affect mood with color therapy. Collective gardening can foster a sense of community and purpose. Additionally, by recognizing the ever-evolving planet with global warming, horticulture therapy teaches important lessons in responsibility, accountability, and sustainability. Growing local food provides an opportunity to be involved in your own mental and physical health and gives you a chance for your own self-resilience, combating depression and a lack of nutrition. In adolescents, the process of watering and caring for plants can teach important life lessons that transcend beyond the garden by providing knowledge on how to care for yourself and how to be an active member of society. It also gives a sense of purpose and pride in transforming a small seed into a plant that can be consumed or enjoyed by others. Mr. Spruth and Ms. Herbert recognize the importance of bringing more green spaces to urban areas, both to serve a nutritional benefit and provide a beautiful transformation to underutilized areas. Gardens can bring beauty, wellness, and hope to dark spaces and provide immeasurable benefits for all.

Keywords: growth, hope, mental health, sustainability, transformation, wellness

Procedia PDF Downloads 90

Authors: Francesco Saverio Angiò

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The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant / Syria (ISIL/S), Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad, also known as ‘Boko Haram’ (BH), have fought successfully against Syria and Iraq, Mali, Nigeria’s government, respectively. According to Napoleoni, the ‘shell-state’ concept can explain the economic dimension and the financing model of the ISIL insurgency. However, she argues that AQIM and BH did not properly plan their financial model. Consequently, her idea would not be suitable to these groups. Nevertheless, AQIM and BH’s economic performances and their (short) territorialisation suggest that their financing models respond to a well-defined strategy, which they were able to adapt to new circumstances. Therefore, Napoleoni’s idea of ‘shell-state’ can be applied to the three jihadist armed groups. In the last five years, together with other similar entities, ISIL/S, AQIM and BH have been fighting against governments with insurgent tactics and terrorism acts, conquering and ruling a quasi-state; a physical space they presented as legitimate territorial entity, thanks to a puritan version of the Islamic law. In these territories, they have exploited the traditional local economic networks. In addition, they have contributed to the development of legal and illegal transnational business activities. They have also established a justice system and created an administrative structure to supply services. Napoleoni’s ‘shell-state’ can describe the evolution of ISIL/S, AQIM and BH, which has switched from an insurgency to a proto or a quasi-state entity, enjoying a significant share of power over territories and populations. Napoleoni first developed and applied the ‘Shell-state’ concept to describe the nature of groups such as the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), before using it to explain the expansion of ISIL. However, her original conceptualisation emphasises on the economic dimension of the rise of the insurgency, focusing on the ‘business’ model and the insurgents’ financing management skills, which permits them to turn into an organisation. However, the idea of groups which use, coordinate and grab some territorial economic activities (at the same time, encouraging new criminal ones), can also be applied to administrative, social, infrastructural, legal and military levels of their insurgency, since they contribute to transform the insurgency to the same extent the economic dimension does. In addition, according to Napoleoni’s view, the ‘shell-state’ prism is valid to understand the ISIL/S phenomenon, because the group has carefully planned their financial steps. Napoleoni affirmed that ISIL/S carries out activities in order to promote their conversion from a group relying on external sponsors to an entity that can penetrate and condition local economies. On the contrary, ‘shell-state’ could not be applied to AQIM or BH, which are acting more like smugglers. Nevertheless, despite its failure to control territories, as ISIL has been able to do, AQIM and BH have responded strategically to their economic circumstances and have defined specific dynamics to ensure a flow of stable funds. Therefore, Napoleoni’s theory is applicable.

Keywords: shell-state, jihadist insurgency, proto or quasi-state entity economic planning, strategic financing

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Authors: Manushi Srivastava

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Introduction: Doctor’s role, and relation with respect to patient care is at the core of medical ethics. The rapid pace of medical advances along with increasing consumer awareness about their rights and hike in cost of effective health care demand a robust, transparent and patient-friendly medical care system. However, doctors’ role performance is still in the frame of activity-passivity model of Doctor-Patient Relationship (DPR) where doctors act as parent and use to instruct their patients, without their consensus that is not going to help in the 21st century. Thus the current situation is a new challenge for traditional doctor-patient relationship after the introduction of Consumer Protection Act (CPA) in medical profession and the same is evidenced by increasing cases of medical litigation. To strengthen this system of medical services, the doctor plays a vital role, and the same should be reviewed in the present context. Objective: To understand the opinion of consultants regarding medical negligence and effect of Consumer Protection Act in terms of current practices of patient care. Method: This is a cross-sectional study in which both quantitative and qualitative methods are applied. Total 69 consultants were selected from multi-specialty hospitals of densely populated Varanasi city catering a population of about 1.8 million. Two-stage sampling was used for selection of respondents. At the first stage, selection of major wards (Medicine, Surgery, Ophthalmology, Gynaecology, Orthopaedics, and Paediatrics) was carried out, which are more susceptible to medical negligence. At the second stage, selection of consultants from the respective wards was carried out. In-depth Interviews were conducted with the help of semi-structured schedule. Two case studies of medical negligence were also carried out as part of the qualitative study. Analysis: Data were analyzed with the help of SPSS software (21.0 trial version). Semi-structured research tool was used to know consultant’s opinion about the pattern of medical negligence cases, litigations and claims made by patient community and inclusion of government medical services in CPA. Statistical analysis was done to describe data, and non-parametric test was used to observe the association between the variables. Analysis of Verbatim was used in case-study. Findings and Conclusion: Majority (92.8%) of consultants felt changes in the behaviour of community (patient) after implementation of CPA, as it had increased awareness about their rights. Less than half of the consultants opined that Medical Negligence is an Unintentional act of doctors and generally occurs due to communication gap and behavioural problem between doctor and patients. Experienced consultants ( > 10 years) pointed out that unethical practice by doctors and mal-intention of patient to harass doctors were additional reasons of Medical Negligence. In-depth interview revealed that now patients’ community expects more transparency and hence they demand cafeteria approach in diagnosis and management of cases. Thus as study results, we propose ‘Agreement Model’ of DPR to re-ensure ethical practice in medical profession.

Keywords: doctors, communication, consumer protection act (CPA), medical error

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Authors: Jeet Vijay Sah, Alphonsa Joseph, Pravin Kumari Dwivedi, Ghanshyam Jhala, Subroto Mukherjee

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AISI 304 is known for its corrosion resistance which comes from Cr that forms passive Cr₂O₃ on the surface. But its poor hardness makes it unsuitable for applications where the steel also requires high wear resistance. This can be improved by surface hardening using nitrocarburizing processes, which form ε-Fe2-3N, γ’-Fe4N, nitrides, and carbides of Cr and Fe on the surface and subsurface. These formed phases give the surface greater hardness, but the corrosion resistance drops because of the lack of Cr2O3 passivation as a result. To overcome this problem, plasma nitrocarburizing processes are being developed where the process temperatures are kept below 723 K to avoid Cr-N precipitation. In the presented work, low-temperature pulsed-DC plasma nitrocarburizing utilizing a discharge of N₂-H₂-C₂H₂ at 500 Pa with varying N₂:H₂ ratios was conducted on AISI 304 samples at 673 K. The process durations were also varied, and the samples were characterized by microindentation using Vicker’s hardness tester, corrosion resistances were established from electrochemical impedance studies, and corrosion potentials and corrosion currents were obtained by potentiodynamic polarization testing. XRD revealed S-phase, which is a supersaturated solid solution of N and C in the γ phase. The S-phase was observed to be composed of the expanded phases of γ; γN, γC, and γ’N and ε’N phases. Significant improvement in surface hardness was achieved after every process, which is attributed to the S-phase. Corrosion resistance was also found to improve after the processes. The samples were also characterized by XPS, SEM, and GDOES.

Keywords: AISI 304, surface engineering, nitrocarburizing, S-phase

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Authors: Rashed Shah, Jeanne Koepsell, Dixmer Rivera, Eric Swedberg, David Marsh

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Success of primary health care goals of health promotion and disease prevention may well be determined by community based health workers’ overall job satisfaction. It is also important to understand the ways community health workers perceive their jobs and the importance they give to the various factors influencing their job satisfaction, which is critical before making a decision for task-shifting and for expanding their scope of work. Although brigadistas are unpaid volunteers, they are formally recognized and receive support and supervision from the Ministry of Health in Nicaragua. Brigadistas are responsible for classifying and diagnosing illnesses, administering treatment, counseling mothers and care givers within the community, encouraging referral in case of serious illness and making follow-up visits at home. Some brigadistas provide more technically advanced services, including treatment for pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria and tuberculosis and/or distribution of contraceptives. Expanding brigadistas’ duties could threaten their heretofore ‘job satisfaction’. This study primarily aims to report on job satisfaction of brigadistas in Nicaragua before expanding the scope of their work by adding more responsibilities. The study was guided by the following research questions: 1) What aspects of their job made the brigadistas satisfied or dissatisfied? 2) What is the job satisfaction level of brigadistas in Nicaragua? This cross-sectional study was conducted during March – July 2014, to assess brigadistas’ job satisfaction, prior to deciding on inclusion of care for sick newborns and young infants (<2 months of age) to brigadistas’ existing service package of community case management for children of 2-59 months of age. Following stratified random sampling strategy, 15 brigadistas were randomly selected from each of the following four strata: [(1) females under 25 years of age, (2) females over 30 years of age, (3) males under 25 years of age, and (4) males over 30 years of age. Out of 45 completed in-person interview with eligible and available brigadistas, 20 (44.4%) were with female and 25 (55.6%) were with male respondents; the mean age (±sd) was found as 32.0 (±3.2) years. About 53% (24/45) brigadista mentioned “Training” as the most helpful for performing their job. Another 31% (14/45) mentioned that “feeling of doing good, supporting community, women and children” was helpful to perform their job well. When asked about difficulty, about 35.5% (16/45) brigadistas mentioned about “Lack of time” due to their responsibilities in family, farm, other work places, study and such time constraint made their job performance difficult. Measured on a 0-5 scale, estimated average job satisfaction was 4.2. Current trends in task-shifting and integrated program delivery require community health workers (like the brigadistas) to deliver several essential services, including maternal, newborn and child health, and family planning, and thereby increasing their responsibilities. Given the reported level of job satisfaction among brigadistas (4.2 out of 5), and the mentioned difficulty in performing their current job (as ‘Lack of Time’) in this study results, the policy makers and program managers in MOH should be cautious enough before making a decision to expand current scope of work for brigadistas in Nicaragua.

Keywords: Brigadisata, job satisfaction, Nicaragua, task-shifting

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Authors: Jadwiga Fila, Mateusz Jezowski, Pawel Poszytek

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The outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic started the times of crisis full of uncertainty, especially in the field of transnational cooperation projects based on the international mobility of their participants. This is notably the case of Erasmus+ Program for higher education, which is the flagship European initiative boosting cooperation between educational institutions, businesses, and other actors, enabling students and staff mobility, as well as strategic partnerships between different parties. The aim of this abstract is to study whether competences 4.0 are able to empower Erasmus+ project leaders in sustaining their international cooperation in times of global crisis, widespread online learning, and common project disruption or cancellation. The concept of competences 4.0 emerged from the notion of the industry 4.0, and it relates to skills that are fundamental for the current labor market. For the aim of the study presented in this abstract, four main 4.0 competences were distinguished: digital, managerial, social, and cognitive competence. The hypothesis for the study stipulated that the above-mentioned highly-developed competences may act as a protective shield against the pandemic challenges in terms of projects’ sustainability and continuation. The objective of the research was to assess to what extent individual competences are useful in managing projects in times of crisis. For this purpose, the study was conducted, involving, among others, 141 Polish higher education project leaders who were running their cooperation projects during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic (Mar-Nov 2020). The research explored the self-perception of the above-mentioned competences among Erasmus+ project leaders and the contextual data regarding the sustainability of the projects. The quantitative character of data permitted validation of scales (Cronbach’s Alfa measure), and the use of factor analysis made it possible to create a distinctive variable for each competence and its dimensions. Finally, logistic regression was used to examine the association of competences and other factors on project status. The study shows that the project leaders’ competence profile attributed the highest score to digital competence (4.36 on the 1-5 scale). Slightly lower values were obtained for cognitive competence (3.96) and managerial competence (3.82). The lowest score was accorded to one specific dimension of social competence: adaptability and ability to manage stress (1.74), which proves that the pandemic was a real challenge which had to be faced by project coordinators. For higher education projects, 10% were suspended or prolonged because of the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas 90% were undisrupted (continued or already successfully finished). The quantitative analysis showed a positive relationship between the leaders’ levels of competences and the projects status. In the case of all competences, the scores were higher for project leaders who finished projects successfully than for leaders who suspended or prolonged their projects. The research demonstrated that, in the demanding times of the COVID-19 pandemic, competences 4.0, to a certain extent, do play a significant role in the successful management of Erasmus+ projects. The implementation and sustainability of international educational projects, despite mobility and sanitary obstacles, depended, among other factors, on the level of leaders’ competences.

Keywords: Competences 4.0, COVID-19 pandemic, Erasmus+ Program, international education, project sustainability

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Authors: Bunakiye R. Japheth, Ogude U. Cyril

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Since the process of transforming user requirements to modeling constructs are not very well supported by domain-specific frameworks, it became necessary to integrate domain requirements with the specific architectures to achieve an integrated customizable solutions space via artifact orientation. Domain-specific modeling language specifications of model-driven engineering technologies focus more on requirements within a particular domain, which can be tailored to aid the domain expert in expressing domain concepts effectively. Modeling processes through domain-specific language formalisms are highly volatile due to dependencies on domain concepts or used process models. A capable solution is given by artifact orientation that stresses on the results rather than expressing a strict dependence on complicated platforms for model creation and development. Based on this premise, domain-specific methods for producing artifacts without having to take into account the complexity and variability of platforms for model definitions can be integrated to support customizable development. In this paper, we discuss methods for the integration capabilities and necessities within a common structure and semantics that contribute a metamodel for artifact-orientation, which leads to a reusable software layer with concrete syntax capable of determining design intents from domain expert. These concepts forming the language formalism are established from models explained within the oil and gas pipelines industry.

Keywords: control process, metrics of engineering, structured abstraction, semantic model

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Authors: Dadash Huseynov, Elmira Aliyeva, Robert Hoogendoorn, Salomon Kroonenberg

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The study of organic material in bottom sediments together with lithologic and biostratigraphic data improves our understanding of the evolution of fluvial and deltaic systems. The modern Kura River delta is located in the Southwest Caspian Sea and is fluvial-dominated. The river distributes its sediment load through three channels oriented North-East, South-East, and South-West. The offshore modern delta consists of thinly bedded or laminated silty clays and dark grey clays. Locally sand and shell-rich horizons occur. Onshore delta is composed of channel-levee sands and floodplain silts and clays. Overall sedimentation rates in the delta determined by the 210Pb method range between 1.5-3.0 cm/yr. We investigated the distribution of organic material in the deltaic sediments in 300 samples selected from 3m deep piston cores. The studies of transparent sections demonstrate that deltaic sediments are enriched in terrestrial debris. It is non-transparent and has an irregular, isometric, or elongated shape, angular edges, black or dark-brown colour, and a clearly expressed fabric. Partially it is dissolved at the edges and is replaced by iron sulphides. Fragments of marine algae have more smooth edges, brown colour. They are transparent; the fabric is rarely preserved. The evidences of dissolution and gelification are well observed. Iron sulphides are common. The recorded third type of organic material has a round, drop-like, or oval shape and belongs to planktonic organisms. Their initial organic material is strongly transformed or replaced by dark organic compounds, probably, neoplasms. The particles are red-brown and transparent. The iron sulphides are not observed. The amount of Corg in the uppermost portion of sediments accumulated in the offshore Kura River delta varies from 0.2 to 1.22%, with median values of 0.6-0.8%. In poorly sorted sediments Corg content changes from 0.24 to 0.97% (average 0.69%), silty-sandy clay - 0.45 to 1.22% (average 0.77%), sandy-silty clay - 0.5 to 0.97% (average 0.67%), silty clay - 0.52 to 0.95% (average 0.70%). The data demonstrate that in sediments deposited during Caspian Sea high stand in 1929, the minimum of Corg content is localised near the mouth of the main south-eastern distributary channel and coincides with the minimum of the clay fraction. At the same time, the maximum of organic matter content locates near the mouth of the eastern channel, which was inactive at that time. In sediments accumulated during the last Caspian Sea low stand in 1977, the area of Corg minimum is attached to the north-eastern distributary’s mouth. It indicates the high activity of this distributary during the Caspian Sea fall. The area of Corg minimum is also recorded around the mouth of the main channel and eastern part of the delta. Maximums of Corg and clay fraction shift towards the basin. During the Caspian high stand in 1995, the minimum of Corg content is again observed in the mouth of the main south-eastern channel. The distribution of organic matter in the modern sediments of the Kura river delta displays the strong time dependence and reflects progradational-retrogradational cycles of evolution of this fluvial-deltaic system.

Keywords: high and low stands, Kura River delta, South Caspian Sea, organic matter

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Authors: Rômulo Eustáquio Martins de Souza, Paulo Alexandre Rodrigues de Vasconcelos Figueiredo

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In recent years, there has been a surge in interest in applying artificial intelligence techniques, particularly machine learning algorithms. Machine learning is a data-analysis technique that automates the creation of analytical models, making it especially useful for designing complex situations. As a result, this technology aids in reducing human intervention while producing accurate results. This methodology is also extensively used in aerospace engineering since this is a field that encompasses several high-complexity operations, such as rocket propulsion. Rocket propulsion is a high-risk operation in which engine failure could result in the loss of life. As a result, it is critical to use computational methods capable of precisely representing the spacecraft's analytical model to guarantee its security and operation. Thus, this paper describes the use of machine learning algorithms for rocket propulsion to aid the realization that this technique is an efficient way to deal with challenging and restrictive aerospace engineering activities. The paper focuses on three machine-learning-aided rocket propulsion applications: set-point control of an expander-bleed rocket engine, supersonic retro-propulsion of a small-scale rocket, and leak detection and isolation on rocket engine data. This paper describes the data-driven methods used for each implementation in depth and presents the obtained results.

Keywords: data analysis, modeling, machine learning, aerospace, rocket propulsion

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Authors: A. Sgobba, C. Meskell

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The feasibility of on-site electricity production from solar and wind and the resulting load management for a specific manufacturing plant in Ireland are assessed. The industry sector accounts directly and indirectly for a high percentage of electricity consumption and global greenhouse gas emissions; therefore, it will play a key role in emission reduction and control. Manufacturing plants, in particular, are often located in non-residential areas since they require open spaces for production machinery, parking facilities for the employees, appropriate routes for supply and delivery, special connections to the national grid and other environmental impacts. Since they have larger spaces compared to commercial sites in urban areas, they represent an appropriate case study for evaluating the technical and economic viability of energy system integration with low power density technologies, such as solar and wind, for on-site electricity generation. The available open space surrounding the analysed manufacturing plant can be efficiently used to produce a discrete quantity of energy, instantaneously and locally consumed. Therefore, transmission and distribution losses can be reduced. The usage of storage is not required due to the high and almost constant electricity consumption profile. The energy load of the plant is identified through the analysis of gas and electricity consumption, both internally monitored and reported on the bills. These data are not often recorded and available to third parties since manufacturing companies usually keep track only of the overall energy expenditures. The solar potential is modelled for a period of 21 years based on global horizontal irradiation data; the hourly direct and diffuse radiation and the energy produced by the system at the optimum pitch angle are calculated. The model is validated using PVWatts and SAM tools. Wind speed data are available for the same period within one-hour step at a height of 10m. Since the hub of a typical wind turbine reaches a higher altitude, complementary data for a different location at 50m have been compared, and a model for the estimate of wind speed at the required height in the right location is defined. Weibull Statistical Distribution is used to evaluate the wind energy potential of the site. The results show that solar and wind energy are, as expected, generally decoupled. Based on the real case study, the percentage of load covered every hour by on-site generation (Level of Autonomy LA) and the resulting electricity bought from the grid (Expected Energy Not Supplied EENS) are calculated. The economic viability of the project is assessed through Net Present Value, and the influence the main technical and economic parameters have on NPV is presented. Since the results show that the analysed renewable sources can not provide enough electricity, the integration with a cogeneration technology is studied. Finally, the benefit to energy system integration of wind, solar and a cogeneration technology is evaluated and discussed.

Keywords: demand, energy system integration, load, manufacturing, national grid, renewable energy sources

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Authors: Nana Katsitadze, Tamar Atanelishvili, Mariam Kutateladze, Alexandre Tushishvili

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In the modern world, tourism has emerged as one of the most powerful economic sectors, and due to its high economic performance, it is attractive to the countries with various levels of economic development. The purpose of the present paper, dedicated to discussing the current problems of tourism development, is to find ways which will contribute to bringing more benefits to the country from the sector. Georgia has been successfully developing leisure tourism for the last ten years, and at the next stage of development business, tourism gains particular importance for Georgia as a means of mitigating the negative socio-economic effects caused by the seasonality of tourism and as a high-cost tourism market. Therefore, the object of the paper is to study the factors that contribute to the development of business tourism. The paper uses the research methods such as system analysis, synthesis, analogy, as well as historical, comparative, economic, and statistical methods of analysis. The information base for the research is made up of the statistics on the functioning of the tourism market of Georgia and foreign countries as well as official data provided by international organizations in the field of tourism. Based on the experience of business tourism around the world and identifying the successful start of business tourism development in Georgia and its causing factors, a business tourism development model for Georgia has been developed. The model might be useful as a methodological material for developing a business tourism development concept for the countries with limited financial resources but rich in tourism resources like Georgia. On the initial stage of development (in absence of conventional centers), the suggested concept of business tourism development involves organizing small and medium-sized meetings both in large cities and in regions by using high-class hotel infrastructure and event management services. Relocation of small meetings to the regions encourages inclusive development of the sector based on increasing the awareness of these regions as tourist sites as well as the increase in employment and sales of other tourism or consumer products. Business tourism increases the number of hotel visitors in the non-seasonal period and improves hotel performance indicators, which enhances the attractiveness of investing in the hotel business. According to the present concept of business tourism development, at the initial stage, development of business tourism is based on the existing markets, including internal market, neighboring markets and the markets of geographically relatively near countries and at the next stage, the concept involves generating tourists from other relatively distant target markets. As a result, by gaining experience in business tourism, enhancing professionalism, increasing awareness and stimulating infrastructure development, the country will prepare the basis to move to a higher stage of tourism development. In addition, the experience showed that for attracting large customers, peculiarities of the field require activation of state policy and active use of marketing mechanisms and tools of the state.

Keywords: hotel industry development, MICE model, MICE strategy, MICE tourism in Georgia

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Authors: Cecilia Sosa, Fernanda Figueroa, Leonardo Calzada

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Biosphere reserves (BR) are considered as the main strategy for biodiversity and ecosystems conservation. Mexican BR are mainly inhabited by rural communities who strongly depend on forests and their resources. Even though the dual objective of conservation and development has been sought in BR, land cover change is a common process in these areas, while most rural communities are highly marginalized, partly as a result of restrictions imposed by conservation to the access and use of resources. Achieving ecosystems conservation and social development face serious challenges. Factors such as financial support for development projects (public/private), environmental conditions, infrastructure and regional economic conditions might influence both land use change and wellbeing. Examining the temporal trends of conservation and development in BR is central for the evaluation of outcomes for these conservation strategies. In this study, we analyzed changes in primary vegetation cover (as a proxy for conservation) and the index of marginalization (as a proxy for development) in Mexican BR (2000-2015); we also explore the influence of various factors affecting these trends, such as conservation-development projects financial support (public or private), geographical distribution in ecoregions (as a proxy for shared environmental conditions) and in economic zones (as a proxy for regional economic conditions). We developed a spatial analysis at the municipal scale (2,458 municipalities nationwide) in ArcGIS, to obtain road densities, geographical distribution in ecoregions and economic zones, the financial support received, and the percent of municipality area under protection by protected areas and, particularly, by BR. Those municipalities with less than 25% of area under protection were regarded as part of the protected area. We obtained marginalization indexes for all municipalities and, using MODIS in Google Earth Engine, the number of pixels covered by primary vegetation. We used a linear mixed model in RStudio for the analysis. We found a positive correlation between the marginalization index and the percent of primary vegetation cover per year (r=0.49-0.5); i.e., municipalities with higher marginalization also show higher percent of primary vegetation cover. Also, those municipalities with higher area under protection have more development projects (r=0.46) and some environmental conditions were relevant for percent of vegetation cover. Time, economic zones and marginalization index were all important. Time was particularly, in 2005, when both marginalization and deforestation decreased. Road densities and financial support for conservation-development projects were irrelevant as factors in the general correlation. Marginalization is still being affected by the conservation strategies applied in BR, even though that this management category considers both conservation and development of local communities as its objectives. Our results suggest that roads densities and support for conservation-development projects have not been a factor of poverty alleviation. As better conservation is being attained in the most impoverished areas, we face the dilemma of how to improve wellbeing in rural communities under conservation, since current strategies have not been able to leave behind the conservation-development contraposition.

Keywords: deforestation, local development, marginalization, protected areas

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Authors: Marit D. Murry, Amy K. Marks

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The transition to college is a critical period that affords abundant opportunities for growth in conjunction with novel challenges for emerging adults. During this time, emerging adults are garnering experiences and acquiring hosts of new information that they are required to synthesize and use to inform life-shaping decisions. This stage is characterized by instability and exploration, which necessitates a diverse set of coping skills to successfully navigate and positively adapt to their evolving environment. However, important sociocultural factors result in differences that occur developmentally for minority emerging adults (i.e., emerging adults with an identity that has been or is marginalized). While the transition to college holds vast potential, not all are afforded the same chances, and many individuals enter into this stage at varying degrees of readiness. Understanding the nuance and diversity of student preparedness for college and contextualizing these factors will better equip systems to support incoming students. Emerging adulthood for ethnic, racial minority students presents itself as an opportunity for growth and resiliency in the face of systemic adversity. Ethnic, racial identity (ERI) is defined as an identity that develops as a function of one’s ethnic-racial group membership. Research continues to demonstrate ERI as a resilience factor that promotes positive adjustment in young adulthood. Adaptive coping responses (e.g., engaging in help-seeking behavior, drawing on personal and community resources) have been identified as possible mechanisms through which ERI buffers youth against stressful life events, including discrimination. Additionally, trait mindfulness has been identified as a significant predictor of general psychological health, and mindfulness practice has been shown to be a self-regulatory strategy that promotes healthy stress responses and adaptive coping strategy selection. The current study employed a person-centered approach to explore emerging patterns across ethnic identity development and psychological well-being criterion variables among college freshmen. Data from 283 incoming college freshmen at Northeastern University were analyzed. The Brief COPE Acceptance and Emotional Support scales, the Five Factor Mindfulness Questionnaire, and MIEM Exploration and Affirmation measures were used to inform the cluster profiles. The TwoStep auto-clustering algorithm revealed an optimal three-cluster solution (BIC = 848.49), which classified 92.6% (n = 262) of participants in the sample into one of the three clusters. The clusters were characterized as ‘Mixed Adjustment’, ‘Lowest Adjustment’, and ‘Moderate Adjustment.’ Cluster composition varied significantly by ethnicity X² (2, N = 262) = 7.74 (p = .021) and gender X² (2, N = 259) = 10.40 (p = .034). The ‘Lowest Adjustment’ cluster contained the highest proportion of students of color, 41% (n = 32), and male-identifying students, 44.2% (n = 34). Follow-up analyses showed higher ERI exploration in ‘Moderate Adjustment’ cluster members, also reported higher levels of psychological distress, with significantly elevated depression scores (p = .011), psychological diagnoses of depression (p = .013), anxiety (p = .005) and psychiatric disorders (p = .025). Supporting prior research, students engaging with identity exploration processes often endure more psychological distress. These results indicate that students undergoing identity development may require more socialization and different services beyond normal strategies.

Keywords: adjustment, coping, college, emerging adulthood, ethnic-racial identity, psychological well-being, resilience

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Authors: Waleed Al-Nuaimy, Luke Anastassiou, Manjinder Kainth

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As the process of teaching has evolved with the advent of new technologies over the ages, so has the process of learning. Educators have perpetually found themselves on the lookout for new technology-enhanced methods of teaching in order to increase learning efficiency and decrease ever expanding workloads. Shortly after the invention of the internet, web-based learning started to pick up in the late 1990s and educators quickly found that the process of providing learning material and marking assignments could change thanks to the connectivity offered by the internet. With the creation of early web-based virtual learning environments (VLEs) such as SPIDER and Blackboard, it soon became apparent that VLEs resulted in higher reported computer self-efficacy among students, but at the cost of students being less satisfied with the learning process . It may be argued that the impersonal nature of VLEs, and their limited functionality may have been the leading factors contributing to this reported dissatisfaction. To this day, often faced with the prospects of assigning colossal engineering cohorts their homework and assessments, educators may frequently choose optimally curated assessment formats, such as multiple-choice quizzes and numerical answer input boxes, so that automated grading software embedded in the VLEs can save time and mark student submissions instantaneously. A crucial skill that is meant to be learnt during most science and engineering undergraduate degrees is gaining the confidence in using, solving and deriving mathematical equations. Equations underpin a significant portion of the topics taught in many STEM subjects, and it is in homework assignments and assessments that this understanding is tested. It is not hard to see that this can become challenging if the majority of assignment formats students are engaging with are multiple-choice questions, and educators end up with a reduced perspective of their students’ ability to manipulate equations. Artificial intelligence (AI) has in recent times been shown to be an important consideration for many technologies. In our paper, we explore the use of new AI based software designed to work in conjunction with current VLEs. Using our experience with the software, we discuss its potential to solve a selection of problems ranging from impersonality to the reduction of educator workloads by speeding up the marking process. We examine the software’s potential to increase learning efficiency through its features which claim to allow more customized and higher-quality feedback. We investigate the usability of features allowing students to input equation derivations in a range of different forms, and discuss relevant observations associated with these input methods. Furthermore, we make ethical considerations and discuss potential drawbacks to the software, including the extent to which optical character recognition (OCR) could play a part in the perpetuation of errors and create disagreements between student intent and their submitted assignment answers. It is the intention of the authors that this study will be useful as an example of the implementation of AI in a practical assessment scenario insofar as serving as a springboard for further considerations and studies that utilise AI in the setting and marking of science and engineering assignments.

Keywords: engineering education, assessment, artificial intelligence, optical character recognition (OCR)

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Authors: Richard Mababu Mukiur

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Leadership is an important drive that plays a key role in the success and development of organizations, particularly in the current context of digital transformation, highly competitivity and globalization. Leaders are persons that hold a dominant and privileged position within an organization, field, or sector of activities and are able to manage, motivate and exercise a high degree of influence over other in order to achieve the institutional goals. They achieve commitment and engagement of others to embrace change, and to make good decisions. Leadership studies in higher education institutions have examined how effective leaders hold their organizations, and also to find approaches which fit best in the organizations context for its better management, transformation and improvement. Moreover, recent studies have highlighted the impact of leadership styles on organizational performance and innovation capacities, since some styles give better results than others. Effective leadership is part of learning process that take place through day-to-day tasks, responsibilities, and experiences that influence the organizational performance, innovation and engagement of employees. The adoption of appropriate leadership styles can improve organization results and encourage learning process, team skills and performance, and employees' motivation and engagement. In the case of case of Information Technology sector, leadership styles are particularly crucial since this sector is leading relevant changes and transformations in the knowledge society. In this context, the main objective of this study is to analyze managers leadership styles with their relation to organizational performance and innovation that may be mediated by learning organization process and demographic variables. Therefore, it was hypothesized that the transformational and transactional leadership will be the main style adopted in Information Technology sector and will influence organizational performance and innovation capacity. A sample of 540 participants from Information technology sector has been determined in order to achieve the objective of this study. The Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire was administered as the principal instrument, Scale of innovation and Learning Organization Questionnaire. Correlations and multiple regression analysis have been used as the main techniques of data analysis. The findings indicate that leadership styles have a relevant impact on organizational performance and innovation capacity. The transformational and transactional leadership are predominant styles in Information technology sector. The effective leadership style tend to be characterized by the capacity of generating and sharing knowledge that improve organization performance and innovation capacity. Managers are adopting and adapting their leadership styles that respond to the new organizational, social and cultural challenges and realities of contemporary society. Managers who encourage innovation, foster learning process, share experience are useful to the organization since they contribute to its development and transformation. Learning process capacity and demographic variables (age, gender, and job tenure) mediate the relationship between leadership styles, innovation capacity and organizational performance. The transformational and transactional leadership tend to enhance the organizational performance due to their significant impact on team-building, employees' engagement and satisfaction. Some practical implications and future lines of research have been proposed.

Keywords: leadership styles, tranformational leadership, organisational performance, organisational innovation

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Authors: Sandra Cardoso, Gaspar Pais, Judite Neves, Sandra Cavaca, Fernando Araújo

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In 2021, Portugal has 63 emergency department (ED) visits per 100 people annually, the highest numbers in Europe. While EDs provide a critical service, high use is indicative of inappropriate and inefficient healthcare. In Portugal, all ED have the Manchester Triage System (MTS), a clinical risk management tool to enable that patients are seen in order of clinical priority. In 2023, more than 40% of the ED visits were of non-urgent conditions (blue and green), that could be better managed in primary health care (PHC), meaning wrong use of resources and lack of health literacy. From 2017, the country has a phone line, SNS24 (Contact Centre of the National Health Service), for triage, counseling, and referral service, 24 hours/7 days a week. The pilot project ‘Call before, save lives’ was implemented in the municipalities of Póvoa de Varzim and Vila do Conde (around 150.000 residents), in May 2023, by the executive board of the Portuguese Health Service, with the support of the Shared Services of the Ministry of Health, and local authorities. This geographical area has short travel times, 99% of the population a family doctor and the region is organized in a health local unit (HLU), integrating PHC and the local hospital. The purposes of this project included to increase awareness to contact SNS 24, before going to an ED, and non-urgent conditions oriented to a family doctor, reducing ED visits. The implementation of the project involved two phases, beginning with: i) development of campaigns using local influencers (fishmonger, model, fireman) through local institutions and media; ii) provision of telephone installed on site to contact SNS24; iii) establishment of open consultation in PHC; iv) promotion of the use of SNS24; v) creation of acute consultations at the hospital for complex chronic patients; and vi) direct referral for home hospitalization by PHC. The results of this project showed an excellent level of access to SNS24, an increase in the number of users referred to ED, with great satisfaction of users and professionals. The second phase, initiated in January 2024, for access to the ED, the need for prior referral was established as an admission rule, except for certain situations, as trauma patients. If the patient refuses, their registration in the ED and subsequent screening in accordance with the MTS must be ensured. When the patient is non-urgent, shall not be observed in the ED, provided that, according to his clinical condition, is guaranteed to be referred to PHC or to consultation/day hospital, through effective scheduling of an appointment for the same or the following day. In terms of results, 8 weeks after beginning of phase 2, we assist of a decrease in self-reported patients to ED from 59% to 15%, and a reduction of around 7% of ED visits. The key for this success was an effective public campaign that increases the knowledge of the right use of the health system, and capable of changing behaviors.

Keywords: contact centre of the national health service, emergency department visits, public campaign, health literacy, SNS24

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Authors: Julia Terlet, Thomas H. Beach, Yacine Rezgui

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Urbanization, population growth, climate change and the current increase in water demand have made the adoption of innovative demand management strategies crucial to the water industry. Water conservation in urban areas has to be improved by encouraging consumers to adopt more sustainable habits and behaviours. This includes informing and educating them about their households’ water consumption and advising them about ways to achieve significant savings on a daily basis. This paper presents a study conducted in the context of the European FP7 WISDOM Project. By integrating innovative Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) frameworks, this project aims at achieving a change in water savings. More specifically, behavioural change will be attempted by implementing smart meters and in-home displays in a trial group of selected households within Cardiff (UK). Using this device, consumers will be able to receive feedback and information about their consumption but will also have the opportunity to compare their consumption to the consumption of other consumers and similar households. Following an initial survey, it appeared necessary to implement these in-home displays in a way that matches consumer's motivations to save water. The results demonstrated the importance of various factors influencing people’s daily water consumption. Both the relevant literature on the subject and the results of our survey therefore led us to include within the in-home device a variety of elements. It first appeared crucial to make consumers aware of the economic aspect of water conservation and especially of the significant financial savings that can be achieved by reducing their household’s water consumption on the long term. Likewise, reminding participants of the impact of their consumption on the environment by making them more aware of water scarcity issues around the world will help increasing their motivation to save water. Additionally, peer pressure and social comparisons with neighbours and other consumers, accentuated by the use of online social networks such as Facebook or Twitter, will likely encourage consumers to reduce their consumption. Participants will also be able to compare their current consumption to their past consumption and to observe the consequences of their efforts to save water through diverse graphs and charts. Finally, including a virtual water game within the display will help the whole household, children and adults, to achieve significant reductions by providing them with simple tips and advice to save water on a daily basis. Moreover, by setting daily and weekly goals for them to reach, the game will expectantly generate cooperation between family members. Members of each household will indeed be encouraged to work together to reduce their water consumption within different rooms of the house, such as the bathroom, the kitchen, or the toilets. Overall, this study will allow us to understand the elements that attract consumers the most and the features that are most commonly used by the participants. In this way, we intend to determine the main factors influencing water consumption in order to identify the measures that will most encourage water conservation in both the long and short term.

Keywords: behavioural change, ICT technologies, water consumption, water conservation

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Authors: A. Cittadino, P. Gantes, C. Coviella, M. Casset, A. Sanchez Caro

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Three currently active landfills receive the waste from Buenos Aires city and the Great Buenos Aires suburbs. One of the first landfills to receive solid waste from this area was located in Villa Dominico, some 7 km south from Buenos Aires City. With an area of some 750 ha, including riparian habitats, divided into 14 cells, it received solid wastes from June 1979 through February 2004. In December 2010, a biological monitoring program was set up by CEAMSE and Universidad Nacional de Lujan, still operational to date. The aim of the monitoring program is to assess the state of several biological groups within the landfill and to follow their dynamics overtime in order to identify if any, early signs of damage the landfill activities might have over the biota present. Bird and rodent populations, aquatic and terrestrial invertebrates’ populations, cells vegetation coverage, and surrounding areas vegetation coverage and main composition are followed by quarterly samplings. Bird species richness and abundance were estimated by observation over walk transects on each environment. A total of 74 different species of birds were identified. Species richness and diversity were high for both riparian surrounding areas and within the landfill. Several grassland -typical of the 'Pampa'- bird species were found within the landfill, as well as some migratory and endangered bird species. Sherman and Tomahawk traps are set overnight for small mammal sampling. Rodent populations are just above detection limits, and the few specimens captured belong mainly to species common to rural areas, instead of city-dwelling species. The two marsupial species present in the region were captured on occasions. Aquatic macroinvertebrates were sampled on a watercourse upstream and downstream the outlet of the landfill’s wastewater treatment plant and are used to follow water quality using biological indices. Water quality ranged between weak and severe pollution; benthic invertebrates sampled before and after the landfill, show no significant differences in water quality using the IBMWP index. Insect biota from yellow sticky cards and pitfall traps showed over 90 different morphospecies, with Shannon diversity index running from 1.9 to 3.9, strongly affected by the season. An easy-to-perform non-expert demandant method was used to assess vegetation coverage. Two scales of determination are utilized: field observation (1 m resolution), and Google Earth images (that allow for a better than 5 m resolution). Over the eight year period of the study, vegetation coverage over the landfill cells run from a low 83% to 100% on different cells, with an average between 95 to 99% for the entire landfill depending on seasonality. Surrounding area vegetation showed almost 100% coverage during the entire period, with an average density from 2 to 6 species per sq meter and no signs of leachate damaged vegetation.

Keywords: biological indicators, biota monitoring, landfill species diversity, waste management

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Authors: Rashmi Dubey

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The study aims at investigating the onset of thermal convection in an inclined porous layer saturated with a non-Newtonian fluid. The layer is infinitely extended and has a finite width confined between two boundaries with constant pressure conditions, where the lower one is maintained at a higher temperature. Over the years, this area of research has attracted many scientists and researchers, for it has a plethora of applications in the fields of sciences and engineering, such as in civil engineering, geothermal sites, petroleum industries, etc.Considering the possibilities in a practical scenario, an inclined porous layer is considered, which can be used to develop a generalized model applicable to any inclination. Using the isobaric boundaries, the hydrodynamic boundary conditions are derived for the power-law model and are used to obtain the basic state flow. The convection in the basic state flow is driven by the thermal buoyancy in the flow system and is carried away further due to hydrodynamic boundaries. A linear stability analysis followed by a normal-mode analysis is done to investigate the onset of convection in the buoyancy-driven flow. The analysis shows that the convective instability is always initiated by the non-traveling modes for the Newtonian fluid, but prevails in the form of oscillatory modes, for up to a certain inclination of the porous layer. However, different behavior is observed for the dilatant and pseudoplastic fluids.

Keywords: thermal convection, linear stability, porous media flow, Inclined porous layer

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Authors: Noura Al Akkari, Aurélie Foucquier, Sylvain Lespinats

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Load monitoring is a management process for energy consumption towards energy savings and energy efficiency. Non Intrusive Load Monitoring (NILM) is one method of load monitoring used for disaggregation purposes. NILM is a technique for identifying individual appliances based on the analysis of the whole residence data retrieved from the main power meter of the house. Our NILM framework starts with data acquisition, followed by data preprocessing, then event detection, feature extraction, then general appliance modeling and identification at the final stage. The event detection stage is a core component of NILM process since event detection techniques lead to the extraction of appliance features. Appliance features are required for the accurate identification of the household devices. In this research work, we aim at developing a new event detection methodology with accurate load disaggregation to extract appliance features. Time-domain features extracted are used for tuning general appliance models for appliance identification and classification steps. We use unsupervised algorithms such as Dynamic Time Warping (DTW). The proposed method relies on detecting areas of operation of each residential appliance based on the power demand. Then, detecting the time at which each selected appliance changes its states. In order to fit with practical existing smart meters capabilities, we work on low sampling data with a frequency of (1/60) Hz. The data is simulated on Load Profile Generator software (LPG), which was not previously taken into consideration for NILM purposes in the literature. LPG is a numerical software that uses behaviour simulation of people inside the house to generate residential energy consumption data. The proposed event detection method targets low consumption loads that are difficult to detect. Also, it facilitates the extraction of specific features used for general appliance modeling. In addition to this, the identification process includes unsupervised techniques such as DTW. To our best knowledge, there exist few unsupervised techniques employed with low sampling data in comparison to the many supervised techniques used for such cases. We extract a power interval at which falls the operation of the selected appliance along with a time vector for the values delimiting the state transitions of the appliance. After this, appliance signatures are formed from extracted power, geometrical and statistical features. Afterwards, those formed signatures are used to tune general model types for appliances identification using unsupervised algorithms. This method is evaluated using both simulated data on LPG and real-time Reference Energy Disaggregation Dataset (REDD). For that, we compute performance metrics using confusion matrix based metrics, considering accuracy, precision, recall and error-rate. The performance analysis of our methodology is then compared with other detection techniques previously used in the literature review, such as detection techniques based on statistical variations and abrupt changes (Variance Sliding Window and Cumulative Sum).

Keywords: general appliance model, non intrusive load monitoring, events detection, unsupervised techniques;

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Authors: Neusa Fernanda Torres, Buyisile Chibi, Lyn E. Middleton, Vernon P. Solomon, Tivani P. Mashamba-Thompson

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Background: Self-medication with antibiotics (SMA) is a global concern, with a higher incidence in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite intense world-wide efforts to control and promote the rational use of antibiotics, continuing practices of SMA systematically exposes individuals and communities to the risk of antibiotic resistance and other undesirable antibiotic side effects. Moreover, it increases the health systems costs of acquiring more powerful antibiotics to treat the resistant infection. This review thus maps evidence on the factors influencing self-medication with antibiotics in these settings. Methods: The search strategy for this review involved electronic databases including PubMed, Web of Knowledge, Science Direct, EBSCOhost (PubMed, CINAHL with Full Text, Health Source - Consumer Edition, MEDLINE), Google Scholar, BioMed Central and World Health Organization library, using the search terms:’ Self-Medication’, ‘antibiotics’, ‘factors’ and ‘reasons’. Our search included studies published from 2007 to 2017. Thematic analysis was performed to identify the patterns of evidence on SMA in LMICs. The mixed method quality appraisal tool (MMAT) version 2011 was employed to assess the quality of the included primary studies. Results: Fifteen studies met the inclusion criteria. Studies included population from the rural (46,4%), urban (33,6%) and combined (20%) settings, of the following LMICs: Guatemala (2 studies), India (2), Indonesia (2), Kenya (1), Laos (1), Nepal (1), Nigeria (2), Pakistan (2), Sri Lanka (1), and Yemen (1). The total sample size of all 15 included studies was 7676 participants. The findings of the review show a high prevalence of SMA ranging from 8,1% to 93%. Accessibility, affordability, conditions of health facilities (long waiting, quality of services and workers) as long well as poor health-seeking behavior and lack of information are factors that influence SMA in LMICs. Antibiotics such as amoxicillin, metronidazole, amoxicillin/clavulanic, ampicillin, ciprofloxacin, azithromycin, penicillin, and tetracycline, were the most frequently used for SMA. The major sources of antibiotics included pharmacies, drug stores, leftover drugs, family/friends and old prescription. Sore throat, common cold, cough with mucus, headache, toothache, flu-like symptoms, pain relief, fever, running nose, toothache, upper respiratory tract infections, urinary symptoms, urinary tract infection were the common disease symptoms managed with SMA. Conclusion: Although the information on factors influencing SMA in LMICs is unevenly distributed, the available information revealed the existence of research evidence on antibiotic self-medication in some countries of LMICs. SMA practices are influenced by social-cultural determinants of health and frequently associated with poor dispensing and prescribing practices, deficient health-seeking behavior and consequently with inappropriate drug use. Therefore, there is still a need to conduct further studies (qualitative, quantitative and randomized control trial) on factors and reasons for SMA to correctly address the public health problem in LMICs.

Keywords: antibiotics, factors, reasons, self-medication, low and middle-income countries (LMICs)

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Authors: Claudio Di Benedetto, Irene Bengo

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The objective of the paper is to study how large European companies develop social business (SB) at the base of the economic pyramid (BoP). BoP markets are defined as the four billions people living with an annual income below $3,260 in local purchasing power. Despite they are heterogeneous in terms of geographic range they present some common characteristics: the presence of significant unmet (social) needs, high level of informal economy and the so-called ‘poverty penalty’. As a result, most people living at BoP are excluded from the value created by the global market economy. But it is worth noting, that BoP population with an aggregate purchasing power of around $5 trillion a year, represent a huge opportunity for companies that want to enhance their long-term profitability perspective. We suggest that in this context, the development of SB is, for companies, an innovative and promising way to satisfy unmet social needs and to experience new forms of value creation. Indeed, SB can be considered a strategic model to develop CSR programs that fully integrate the social dimension into the business to create economic and social value simultaneously. Despite in literature many studies have been conducted on social business, only few have explicitly analyzed such phenomenon from a company perspective and their role in the development of such initiatives remains understudied with fragmented results. To fill this gap the paper analyzes the key characteristics of the social business initiatives developed by European companies at BoP. The study was performed analyzing 1475 European companies participating in the United Nation Global Compact, the world’s leading corporate social responsibility program. Through the analysis of the corporate websites the study identifies companies that actually do SB at BoP. For SB initiatives identified, information were collected according to a framework adapted from the SB model developed by preliminary results show that more than one hundred European companies have already implemented social businesses at BoP accounting for the 6,5% of the total. This percentage increases to 15% if the focus is on companies with more than 10.440 employees. In terms of geographic distribution 80% of companies doing SB at BoP are located in western and southern Europe. The companies more active in promoting SB belong to financial sector (20%), energy sector (17%) and food and beverage sector (12%). In terms of social needs addressed almost 30% of the companies develop SB to provide access to energy and WASH, 25% of companies develop SB to reduce local unemployment or to promote local entrepreneurship and 21% of companies develop SB to promote financial inclusion of poor. In developing SB companies implement different social business configurations ranging from forms of outsourcing to internal development models. The study identifies seven main configurations through which company develops social business and each configuration present distinguishing characteristics respect to the involvement of the company in the management, the resources provided and the benefits achieved. By performing different analysis on data collected the paper provides detailed insights on how European companies develop SB at BoP.

Keywords: base of the economic pyramid, corporate social responsibility, social business, social enterprise

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Authors: Maike Andresen, Georg Dochtmann

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Due to political, social, and societal changes in labor organization, top-sharing, defined as job-sharing in leading positions, becomes more important in HRM. German companies are looking for practical and economically meaningful solutions that allow to enduringly increase women’s ratio in management, not only because of a recently implemented quota. Furthermore, supporting employees in achieving work-life balance is perceived as an important goal for a sustainable HRM to gain competitive advantage. Top-sharing is seen as being suitable to reach both goals. To evaluate determinants leading to effective top-sharing, a case study of a newly implemented top-sharing tandem in a large German enterprise was conducted over a period of 15 months. In this company, a full leadership position was split into two 60%-part-time positions held by an experienced female leader in her late career and a female college who took over her first leadership position (mid-career). We assumed a person-person fit in terms of a match of the top sharing partners’ personality profiles (Big Five) and their leadership motivations to be important prerequisites for an effective collaboration between them. We evaluated the person-person fit variables once before the tandem started to work. Both leaders were expected to learn from each other (mentoring, competency development). On an operational level, they were supposed to lead together the same employees in an effective manner (leader-member exchange), presupposing an effective cooperation between both (handing over information). To see developments over time, these processes were evaluated three times over the span of the project. Top-Sharing and the underlined processes are expected to positively influence the tandem’s performance which has been evaluated twice, at the beginning and the end of the project, to assess its development over time as well. The evaluation of the personality and the basic motives suggests that both executives can be a successful top-sharing tandem. The competency evaluations (supervisor as well as self-assessment) increased over the time span. Although the top sharing tandem worked on equal terms, they implemented rather classical than peer-mentoring due to different career ambitions of the tandem partners. Thus, opportunities were not used completely. Team-member exchange scores proved the good cooperation between the top-sharers. Although the employees did not evaluate the leader-member-exchange between them and the two leaders of the tandem homogeneously, the top-sharing tandem itself did not have the impression that the employees’ task performance depended on whom of the tandem was responsible for the task. Furthermore, top-sharing did not negatively influence the performance of both leaders. During qualitative interviews with the top-sharers and their team, we found that the top-sharers could focus more easily on their tasks. The results suggest positive outcomes of top-sharing (e.g. competency improvement, learning from each other through mentoring). Top-Sharing does not hamper performance. Thus, further research and practical implementations are suggested. As part-time jobs are still more often a female solution to increase their work-life- and work-family-balance, top-sharing may be a suitable solution to increase the woman’s ratio in leadership positions as well as to sustainable increase work-life-balance of executives.

Keywords: mentoring, part-time leadership, top-sharing, work-life-balance

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Authors: Mariia V. Efremova, Iana O. Tcareva, Anastasia D. Blokhina, Ivan S. Grebennikov, Anastasia S. Garanina, Maxim A. Abakumov, Yury I. Golovin, Alexander G. Savchenko, Alexander G. Majouga, Natalya L. Klyachko

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During last decades magnetite nanoparticles (NPs) attract a deep interest of scientists due to their potential application in therapy and diagnostics. However, magnetite nanoparticles are toxic and non-stable in physiological conditions. To solve these problems, we decided to create two types of hybrid systems based on magnetite and gold which is inert and biocompatible: gold as a shell material (first type) and gold as separate NPs interfacially bond to magnetite NPs (second type). The synthesis of the first type hybrid nanoparticles was carried out as follows: Magnetite nanoparticles with an average diameter of 9±2 nm were obtained by co-precipitation of iron (II, III) chlorides then they were covered with gold shell by iterative reduction of hydrogen tetrachloroaurate with hydroxylamine hydrochloride. According to the TEM, ICP MS and EDX data, final nanoparticles had an average diameter of 31±4 nm and contained iron even after hydrochloric acid treatment. However, iron signals (K-line, 7,1 keV) were not localized so we can’t speak about one single magnetic core. Described nanoparticles covered with mercapto-PEG acid were non-toxic for human prostate cancer PC-3/ LNCaP cell lines (more than 90% survived cells as compared to control) and had high R2-relaxivity rates (>190 mМ-1s-1) that exceed the transverse relaxation rate of commercial MRI-contrasting agents. These nanoparticles were also used for chymotrypsin enzyme immobilization. The effect of alternating magnetic field on catalytic properties of chymotrypsin immobilized on magnetite nanoparticles, notably the slowdown of catalyzed reaction at the level of 35-40 % was found. The synthesis of the second type hybrid nanoparticles also involved two steps. Firstly, spherical gold nanoparticles with an average diameter of 9±2 nm were synthesized by the reduction of hydrogen tetrachloroaurate with oleylamine; secondly, they were used as seeds during magnetite synthesis by thermal decomposition of iron pentacarbonyl in octadecene. As a result, so-called dumbbell-like structures were obtained where magnetite (cubes with 25±6 nm diagonal) and gold nanoparticles were connected together pairwise. By HRTEM method (first time for this type of structure) an epitaxial growth of magnetite nanoparticles on gold surface with co-orientation of (111) planes was discovered. These nanoparticles were transferred into water by means of block-copolymer Pluronic F127 then loaded with anti-cancer drug doxorubicin and also PSMA-vector specific for LNCaP cell line. Obtained nanoparticles were found to have moderate toxicity for human prostate cancer cells and got into the intracellular space after 45 minutes of incubation (according to fluorescence microscopy data). These materials are also perspective from MRI point of view (R2-relaxivity rates >70 mМ-1s-1). Thereby, in this work magnetite-gold hybrid nanoparticles, which have a strong potential for biomedical application, particularly in targeted drug delivery and magnetic resonance imaging, were synthesized and characterized. That paves the way to the development of special medicine types – theranostics. The authors knowledge financial support from Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation (14.607.21.0132, RFMEFI60715X0132). This work was also supported by Grant of Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation К1-2014-022, Grant of Russian Scientific Foundation 14-13-00731 and MSU development program 5.13.

Keywords: drug delivery, magnetite-gold, MRI contrast agents, nanoparticles, toxicity

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Authors: Salman Imran, Chris Healey

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Traditionally, medical care of children in England and Wales starts from primary care with a referral to secondary care paediatricians who may not investigate further. Many primary care doctors do not undergo a paediatric rotation/exposure in training. As a result, there are many who have not acquired the necessary skills to manage children hence increasing hospital referral. With the current demand on hospitals in the National Health Service managing more problems in the community is needed. One way of handling this is to set up clinics, meetings and huddles in GP surgeries where professionals involved (general practitioner, paediatrician, health visitor, community nurse, dietician, school nurse) come together and share information which can help improve communication and care. The increased awareness and education that paediatricians can impart in this way will help boost confidence for primary care professionals to be able to be more self-sufficient. This has been tried successfully in other regions e.g., St. Mary’s Hospital in London but is crucial for a more rural setting like ours. The primary aim of this project would be to educate specifically GP’s and generally all other health professionals involved. Additional benefits would be providing care nearer home, increasing patient’s confidence in their local surgery, improving communication and reducing unnecessary patient flow to already stretched hospital resources. Methods: This was done as a plan do study act cycle (PDSA). Three clinics were delivered in different practices over six months where feedback from staff and patients was collected. Designated time for teaching/discussion was used which involved some cases from the actual clinics. Both new and follow up patients were included. Two clinics were conducted by a paediatrician and nurse whilst the 3rd involved paediatrician and local doctor. The distance from hospital to clinics varied from two miles to 22 miles approximately. All equipment used was provided by primary care. Results: A total of 30 patients were seen. All patients found the location convenient as it was nearer than the hospital. 70-90% clearly understood the reason for a change in venue. 95% agreed to the importance of their local doctor being involved in their care. 20% needed to be seen in the hospital for further investigations. Patients felt this to be a more personalised, in-depth, friendly and polite experience. Local physicians felt this to be a more relaxed, familiar and local experience for their patients and they managed to get immediate feedback regarding their own clinical management. 90% felt they gained important learning from the discussion time and the paediatrician also learned about their understanding and gaps in knowledge/focus areas. 80% felt this time was valuable for targeted learning. Equipment, information technology, and office space could be improved for the smooth running of any future clinics. Conclusion: The acute paediatric outpatient clinic can be successfully established in primary care facilities. Careful patient selection and adequate facilities are important. We have demonstrated a further step in the reduction of patient flow to hospitals and upskilling primary care health professionals. This service is expected to become more efficient with experience.

Keywords: clinics, education, paediatricians, primary care

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Authors: Margit Kastner

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To overcome the negative consequences associated with large class sizes and to support students in developing the necessary competences (e.g., critical thinking, problem-solving, or team-work skills) a marketing course has been redesigned by implementing project-based learning with peer assessment (PBL&PA). This means that students can voluntarily take advantage of this supplementary offer and explore -in addition to attending the lecture where clicker questions are asked- a real-world problem, find a solution, and assess the results of peers while working in small collaborative groups. In order to handle this with little further effort, the process is technically supported by the university’s e-learning system in such a way that students upload their solution in form of an assignment which is then automatically distributed to peer groups who have to assess the work of three other groups. Finally, students’ work is graded automatically considering both, students’ contribution to the project and the conformity of the peer assessment. The purpose of this study is to evaluate students’ perception of PBL&PA using an online-questionnaire to collect the data. More specifically, it aims to discover students’ motivations for (not) working on a project and the benefits and problems students encounter. In addition to the survey, students’ performance was analyzed by comparing the final grades of those who participated in PBL&PA with those who did not participate. Among the 260 students who filled out the questionnaire, 47% participated in PBL&PA. Besides extrinsic motivations (bonus credits), students’ participation was often motivated by learning and social benefits. Reasons for not working on a project were connected to students’ organization and management of their studies (e.g., time constraints, no/wrong information) and teamwork concerns (e.g., missing engagement of peers, prior negative experiences). In addition, high workload and insufficient extrinsic motivation (bonus credits) were mentioned. With regards to benefits and problems students encountered during the project, students provided more positive than negative comments. Positive aspects most often stated were learning and social benefits while negative ones were mainly attached to the technical implementation. Interestingly, bonus credits were hardly named as a positive aspect meaning that intrinsic motivations have become more important when working on the project. Team aspects generated mixed feelings. In addition, students who voluntarily participated in PBL&PA were, in general, more active and utilized further course offers such as clicker questions. Examining students’ performance at the final exam revealed that students without participating in any of the offered active learning tasks performed poorest in the exam while students who used all activities were best. In conclusion, the goals of the implementation were met in terms of students’ perceived benefits and the positive impact on students’ exam performance. Since the comparison of the automatic grading with faculty grading showed valid results, it is possible to rely only on automatic grading in the future. That way, the additional workload for faculty will be within limits. Thus, the implementation of project-based learning with peer assessment can be recommended for large classes.

Keywords: automated grading, large classes, peer assessment, project-based learning

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Authors: Alexandre Faure, Yoko Mizokami, éRic Dinet

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These recent years, the potential of light in assisting visually impaired people in their indoor mobility has been demonstrated by different studies. Implementing smart lighting systems for selective visual enhancement, especially designed for low-vision people, is an approach that breaks with the existing visual aids. The appearance of the surface of an object is significantly influenced by the lighting conditions and the constituent materials of the objects. Appearance of objects may appear to be different from expectation. Therefore, lighting conditions lead to an important part of accurate material recognition. The main objective of this work was to investigate the effect of the spatial distribution of light on object identification in the context of low vision. The purpose was to determine whether and what specific lighting approaches should be preferred for visually impaired people. A psychophysical experiment was designed to study the ability of individuals to identify the smallest cube of a pair under different lighting diffusion conditions. Participants were divided into two distinct groups: a reference group of observers with normal or corrected-to-normal visual acuity and a test group, in which observers were required to wear visual impairment simulation glasses. All participants were presented with pairs of cubes in a "miniature room" and were instructed to estimate the relative size of the two cubes. The miniature room replicates real-life settings, adorned with decorations and separated from external light sources by black curtains. The correlated color temperature was set to 6000 K, and the horizontal illuminance at the object level at approximately 240 lux. The objects presented for comparison consisted of 11 white cubes and 11 black cubes of different sizes manufactured with a 3D printer. Participants were seated 60 cm away from the objects. Two different levels of light diffuseness were implemented. After receiving instructions, participants were asked to judge whether the two presented cubes were the same size or if one was smaller. They provided one of five possible answers: "Left one is smaller," "Left one is smaller but unsure," "Same size," "Right one is smaller," or "Right one is smaller but unsure.". The method of constant stimuli was used, presenting stimulus pairs in a random order to prevent learning and expectation biases. Each pair consisted of a comparison stimulus and a reference cube. A psychometric function was constructed to link stimulus value with the frequency of correct detection, aiming to determine the 50% correct detection threshold. Collected data were analyzed through graphs illustrating participants' responses to stimuli, with accuracy increasing as the size difference between cubes grew. Statistical analyses, including 2-way ANOVA tests, showed that light diffuseness had no significant impact on the difference threshold, whereas object color had a significant influence in low vision scenarios. The first results and trends derived from this pilot experiment clearly and strongly suggest that future investigations could explore extreme diffusion conditions to comprehensively assess the impact of diffusion on object identification. For example, the first findings related to light diffuseness may be attributed to the range of manipulation, emphasizing the need to explore how other lighting-related factors interact with diffuseness.

Keywords: Lighting, Low Vision, Visual Aid, Object Identification, Psychophysical Experiment

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Authors: Sofia Meacham

Abstract:

In this abstract paper, the Domain-Specific Languages (DSL) evaluation will be presented based on existing literature and years of experience developing DSLs for several domains. The domains we worked on ranged from AI, business applications, and finances/accounting to health. In general, DSLs have been utilised in many domains to provide tailored and efficient solutions to address specific problems. Although they are a reputable method among highly technical circles and have also been used by non-technical experts with success, according to our knowledge, there isn’t a commonly accepted method for evaluating them. There are some methods that define criteria that are adaptations from the general software engineering quality criteria. Other literature focuses on the DSL usability aspect of evaluation and applies methods such as Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and goal modeling. All these approaches are either hard to introduce, such as the goal modeling, or seem to ignore the domain-specific focus of the DSLs. From our experience, the DSLs have domain-specificity in their core, and consequently, the methods to evaluate them should also include domain-specific criteria in their core. The domain-specific criteria would require synergy between the domain experts and the DSL developers in the same way that DSLs cannot be developed without domain-experts involvement. Methods from agile and other software engineering practices, such as co-creation workshops, should be further emphasised and explored to facilitate this direction. Concluding, our latest experience and plans for DSLs evaluation will be presented and open for discussion.

Keywords: domain-specific languages, DSL evaluation, DSL usability, DSL quality metrics

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Authors: Tabbye Chavous, Felecia Webb, Bridget Richardson, Gloryvee Fonseca-Bolorin, Seanna Leath, Robert Sellers

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There has been recent renewed attention to Black students’ experiences at predominantly White U.S. universities (PWIs), e.g., the #BBUM (“Being Black at the University of Michigan”), “I too am Harvard” social media campaigns, and subsequent student protest activities nationwide. These campaigns illuminate how many minority students encounter challenges to their racial/ethnic identities as they enter PWI contexts. Students routinely report experiences such as being ignored or treated as a token in classes, receiving messages of low academic expectations by faculty and peers, being questioned about their academic qualifications or belonging, being excluded from academic and social activities, and being racially profiled and harassed in the broader campus community due to race. Researchers have linked such racial marginalization and stigma experiences to student motivation and achievement. One potential mechanism is through the impact of college experiences on students’ identities, given the relevance of the college context for students’ personal identity development, including personal beliefs systems around social identities salient in this context. However, little research examines the impact of the college context on Black students’ racial identities. This study examined change in Black college students’ (N=329) racial identity beliefs over the freshman year at three predominantly White U.S. universities. Using cluster analyses, we identified profile groups reflecting different patterns of stability and change in students’ racial centrality (importance of race to overall self-concept), private regard (personal group affect/group pride), and public regard (perceptions of societal views of Blacks) from beginning of year (Time 1) to end of year (Time 2). Multinomial logit regression analyses indicated that the racial identity change clusters were predicted by pre-college background (racial composition of high school and neighborhood), as well as college-based experiences (racial discrimination, interracial friendships, and perceived campus racial climate). In particular, experiencing campus racial discrimination related to high, stable centrality, and decreases in private regard and public regard. Perceiving racial climates norms of institutional support for intergroup interactions on campus related to maintaining low and decreasing in private and public regard. Multivariate Analyses of Variance results showed change cluster effects on achievement motivation outcomes at the end of students’ academic year. Having high, stable centrality and high private regard related to more positive outcomes overall (academic competence, positive academic affect, academic curiosity and persistence). Students decreasing in private regard and public regard were particularly vulnerable to negative motivation outcomes. Findings support scholarship indicating both stability in racial identity beliefs and the importance of critical context transitions in racial identity development and adjustment outcomes among emerging adults. Findings also are consistent with research suggesting promotive effects of a strong, positive racial identity on student motivation, as well as research linking awareness of racial stigma to decreased academic engagement.

Keywords: diversity, motivation, learning, ethnic minority achievement, higher education

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Authors: Piacentini Diego, Della Rovere Federica, Fattorini Laura, Lanni Francesca, Cittadini Martina, Altamura Maria Maddalena, Falasca Giuseppina

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Plants have evolved sophisticated mechanisms to cope with environmental cues. Changes in intracellular content and distribution of phytohormones, such as the auxin indole-3-acetic acid (IAA), have been involved in morphogenic adaptation to environmental stresses. In addition to phytohormones, plants can rely on a plethora of small signal molecules able to promptly sense and transduce the stress signals, resulting in morpho/physiological responses thanks also to their capacity to modulate the levels/distribution/reception of most hormones. Among these signaling molecules, nitrogen monoxide (nitric oxide – NO) is a critical component in several plant acclimation strategies to both biotic and abiotic stresses. Depending on its levels, NO increases plant adaptation by enhancing the enzymatic or non-enzymatic antioxidant systems or by acting as a direct scavenger of reactive oxygen/nitrogen (ROS/RNS) species produced during the stress. In addition, exogenous applications of NO-specific donor compounds showed the involvement of the signal molecule in auxin metabolism, transport, and signaling, under both physiological and stress conditions. However, the complex mechanisms underlying NO action in interacting with phytohormones, such as auxins, during metal stress responses are still poorly understood and need to be better investigated. Emphasis must be placed on the response of the root system since it is the first plant organ system to be exposed to metal soil pollution. The monocot Oryza sativa L. (rice) has been chosen given its importance as a stable food for some 4 billion people worldwide. In addition, increasing evidence has shown that rice is often grown in contaminated paddy soils with high levels of heavy metal cadmium (Cd) and metalloid arsenic (As). The facility through which these metals are taken up by rice roots and transported to the aerial organs up to the edible caryopses makes rice one of the most relevant sources of these pollutants for humans. This study aimed to evaluate if NO has a mitigatory activity in the roots of rice seedlings against Cd or As toxicity and to understand if this activity requires interactions with auxin. Our results show that exogenous treatments with the NO-donor SNP alleviate the stress induced by Cd, but not by As, in in-vitro-grown rice seedlings through increased intracellular root NO levels. The damages induced by the pollutants include root growth inhibition, root histological alterations and ROS (H2O2, O2●ˉ), and RNS (ONOOˉ) production. Also, SNP treatments mitigate both the root increase in root IAA levels and the IAA alteration in distribution monitored by the OsDR5::GUS system due to the toxic metal exposure. Notably, the SNP-induced mitigation of the IAA homeostasis altered by the pollutants does not involve changes in the expression of OsYUCCA1 and ASA2 IAA-biosynthetic genes. Taken together, the results highlight a mitigating role of NO in the rice root system, which is pollutant-specific, and involves the interaction of the signal molecule with both IAA and brassinosteroids at different (i.e., transport, levels, distribution) and multiple levels (i.e., transcriptional/post-translational levels). The research is supported by Progetti Ateneo Sapienza University of Rome, grant number: RG120172B773D1FF

Keywords: arsenic, auxin, cadmium, nitric oxide, rice, root system

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