26729 research outputs found
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Professional education with fiction media: imagination for engagement and empathy in learning - edited by Christine Jarvis and Patricia Gouthro, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2019, 251 pp., £99.99 (Hardcover), ISBN 978-3-030-17692 [Book review]
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Employee experience: construct clarification, conceptualization and validation of a new scale
No full textThe COVID-19 crisis has drawn broader public interest in how companies treat their workers, so going forward, people management would be of an increasing concern. As we make a transition from a service-based economy to experience economy, where time well saved takes a back seat to time well spent, the notion of employee experience (EX) is set to become a fundamental workplace design principle. EX is about the work, not the office. EX aims for a complete redesign of the workplace practices and environment to fit the employees and not the other way around. This article examines and verifies EX scale as one-dimensional as well as multidimensional constructs with six dimensions, namely cohesiveness, vigour, well-being, achievement, inclusiveness and physical environment. Six dimensions were explored with focus group and open-ended survey and validated with closed-ended survey of 299 employees working in multinational corporations across India. Structural equation modelling is used to validate the proposed latest construct. Establishing the EX scale would help researchers as well practitioners in empirically measuring EX and its relationship with various individuals as well organizational constructs
Applying text mining and semantic network analysis to investigate effects of perceived crowding in the service sector
Get PDFSemantic analysis is becoming increasingly important not only in computing but also in the business world. The purpose of the current study is to apply semantic network analysis to the service industry, one of the economic sectors. To learn more about the crowded environment in the service sector, the study interviewed customers and employees by using dyad approach in the service sector. The data collected was analyzed using a text mining approach in Python library and Ucinet software. The text data collected through interviews was analyzed using multiple techniques like sentiment analysis, centrality analysis, and CONCOR analysis. The results from the two data sets of interviews with employees and consumers revealed certain effects and behavior that they exhibit in a crowded environment. When providing services to consumers in a crowded environment, employees experience a variety of behavioral changes, whether due to physical, psychological, emotional, habitual, or work-related factors. Additionally, findings show that crowding has an emotional and psychological impact on customers’ behavioral responses. The study offers important implications of text analysis for business intelligence
A machine learning‑based image segmentation method to quantify in vitro osteoclast culture endpoints
Get PDFQuantification of in vitro osteoclast cultures (e.g. cell number) often relies on manual counting methods. These approaches are labour intensive, time consuming and result in substantial inter- and intra-user variability. This study aimed to develop and validate an automated workflow to robustly quantify in vitro osteoclast cultures. Using ilastik, a machine learning-based image analysis software, images of tartrate resistant acid phosphatase-stained mouse osteoclasts cultured on dentine discs were used to train the ilastik-based algorithm. Assessment of algorithm training showed that osteoclast numbers strongly correlated between manual- and automatically quantified values (r = 0.87). Osteoclasts were consistently faithfully segmented by the model when visually compared to the original reflective light images. The ability of this method to detect changes in osteoclast number in response to different treatments was validated using zoledronate, ticagrelor, and co-culture with MCF7 breast cancer cells. Manual and automated counting methods detected a 70% reduction (p < 0.05) in osteoclast number, when cultured with 10 nM zoledronate and a dose-dependent decrease with 1-10 μM ticagrelor (p < 0.05). Co-culture with MCF7 cells increased osteoclast number by ≥ 50% irrespective of quantification method. Overall, an automated image segmentation and analysis workflow, which consistently and sensitively identified in vitro osteoclasts, was developed. Advantages of this workflow are (1) significantly reduction in user variability of endpoint measurements (93%) and analysis time (80%); (2) detection of osteoclasts cultured on different substrates from different species; and (3) easy to use and freely available to use along with tutorial resources
Assessing generative A.I. through the lens of the 2023 Gartner Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies: a collaborative autoethnography
Get PDFThis brief research report examines claims made across contemporary media channels that generative artificial intelligence can be used to develop educational materials, in an experiment to develop a new course for advertising, PR and branding professionals. A collaborative auto-ethnography is employed to examine the journey and unintended consequences experienced by a non-technology lecturer engaging with generative AI for the first-time and is examined under the lens of the 2023 Gartner Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies. The researchers were able to map lived experiences to stages of the Gartner model, presenting evidence that this tool could have extended utility in the field of human resources for the support of technology integration projects. They also recorded several potential manifestations of symptoms related to the problematic use of Internet (PUI). The implications of the findings contribute to ongoing public discourse regarding the introduction of artificial intelligence within education, with insights for policy development and governance, as well as faculty and student wellbeing
Using the Publish or Perish software
No full textThis guide provides you with practical step-by-step guidance on using the Publish or Perish software. After reading this guide, you will know more about citation analysis than 99% of your academic colleagues! You will learn all about its user interface and multi-searches centre, the metrics that PoP calculates, as well as the eight data sources that the software interfaces with. The two most frequently used of these data sources – Google Scholar and Google Scholar Profiles – are discussed in detail in separate chapters. The guide then shows you how to conduct effective author, journal, topic, and affiliation searches, as well as how to use the software for a wide variety of purposes. This includes tenure or promotion applications, conducting literature reviews and meta-analyses, deciding where to submit your paper, preparing for job interviews, writing laudations or obituaries, finding reviewers, examiners, or keynote speakers, preparing for a meeting with your academic hero, uncovering “citation connections” between scholars, doing bibliometric research and much much more
Multi-objective flower pollination algorithm: a new technique for EEG signal denoising
No full textThe electroencephalogram (EEG) signal denoising problem has been considered a challenging task because of several artifact noises, such as eye blinking, eye movement, muscle activity, and power line interference, which can corrupt the original EEG signal during the recording time. Therefore, to remove these noises, the EEG signals must be processed to obtain efficient EEG features. Accordingly, several techniques have been proposed to reduce EEG noises, such as EEG signal denoising using wavelet transform (WT). The success of WT depends on the best configuration of its control parameters, which are often experimentally set. In this study, a multi-objective flower pollination algorithm (MOFPA) with WT (MOFPA-WT) is proposed to solve the EEG signal denoising problem. The novelty of this study is to find optimal EEG signal denoising parameters using MOFPA based on two measurement criteria for the denoised signals, namely minimum mean squared error (MSE) and maximum signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). The MOFPA-WT is tested using a standard EEG signal processing dataset, namely the EEG motor movement/imagery dataset. The performance of MOFPA-WT is evaluated using five criteria, namely SNR, SNR improvement, MSE, root mean squared error (RMSE), and percentage root mean square difference (PRD). Experiments are conducted using FPA with MSE, SNR, and MSE and SNR to show the effect of the multi-objective aspects on the performance of the proposed MOFPA-WT. Results show that FPA with MSE and SNR exhibits more subjective results than FPA with MSE and FPA with SNR. The convergence rate and Pareto front are also studied for the proposed MOFPA-WT
Recurrence of atrial fibrillation post catheter ablation or cardioversion using cardiac implantable electronic device data
No full textIntroduction:
Atrial fibrillation (AF) remains a leading cause of decreased quality of life and increased mortality worldwide. The unpredictable nature of AF makes it challenging to detect episodes, particularly after interventional treatments like catheter ablation or cardioversion. Current literature offers limited insights into real-world outcomes of AF management, especially in cases where continuous monitoring is possible through cardiac implantable electronic devices (CIEDs). This audit aims to evaluate the recurrence of AF in patients undergoing catheter ablation versus cardioversion, using remote monitoring data from CIEDs and to assess any correlation with patients' prior interventional backgrounds.
Methods:
This retrospective, observational departmental audit analysed patients equipped with specific CIEDs capable of remote monitoring who underwent either catheter ablation or cardioversion between 2016 and 2023. Data from the CIED remote monitoring systems were used to assess the recurrence of AF.
Results:
A total of 108 patients were included in the study. The recurrence rate of AF was significantly lower in the catheter ablation group (55%) compared to the cardioversion group (77%). Additionally, patients with a history of previous rhythm-control interventions had a recurrence rate of 73%, compared to 60% in those without such a history, though this difference did not reach statistical significance.
Conclusion:
The findings suggest that CIED remote monitoring is a reliable method for evaluating the success of rhythm-control treatments, with catheter ablation showing a better outcome compared to cardioversion. Patient background did not significantly impact the likelihood of remaining free from AF, emphasizing the need for individualized, long-term follow-up strategies
The impact of COVID-19 crisis on SMEs and their risk management and survival strategies: evidence from Nigeria
No full textThis study aims to examine the effect of COVID-19 on the small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Nigeria and their corporate risk management after the pandemic. The study employed a quantitative methodology to gather information from the SMEs in Nigeria. The findings indicate that Nigerian SMEs experienced the severity of the COVID-19 epidemic, with the majority of the companies surveyed saying that the current coronavirus outbreak had some influence on their firm, such as a reduction in income and the number of employees since the beginning of the pandemic. The findings suggest that conceptualising risk management in SMEs after the COVID-19 crisis within the context of three theories — the Keynesian Theory of Business Cycle, the Social-Ecological Theory, and the Social-Cognitive Theory — holds promise as the theories serve as explanation frameworks
New teixobactin analogues with a total lactam ring
Get PDFTeixobactin is a new antibiotic peptide with strong efficacy against several Gram-positive resistant bacteria, the structure of which is extremely difficult to obtain in the laboratory via multistep conventional synthesis. To face the increasing antibiotic resistant bacteria, it is fundamental to introduce new types of antibiotics with innovative mechanisms of action without resistance; thus, many scientists are studying and developing new methods to synthesize teixobactin analogues. In this work, seven Arg10-teixobactin analogues with a total lactam ring have been prepared via solid phase peptide synthesis. In order to obtain the total lactam ring, d-Thr8 was replaced by (2R,3S)-diamino-propionic acid. To verify their antimicrobial activity and efficacy, each analogue was tested with MIC against different resistant pathogens, showing an interesting activity for Nle11 containing compounds