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Early detection of oesophageal cancer based on colour appearance and colour-based data augmentation
Get PDFOesophagus cancer is the 9th most common cancer and the 6th leading cause of cancer-related death. Globally, the estimated number of new cases was 572 000, of which approximately 509 000 persons died from oesophageal cancer in 2018. While the overall five-year survival rate of oesophagus cancer is less than 20%, this figure can be improved significantly to more than 90% if oesophageal cancer (OC) is detected in its intramucosal stage when lymph node metastasis is unlikely and it still can be treated endoscopically. Hence early detection of oesophageal cancer plays a crucial role. The challenge here is that early stage of caner present subtle changes in comparison with normal skill tissue and can easily missed being diagnosed (1 in 4).
This research investigates the contribution of colour attribute in diagnosis of OC. Two studies are conducted. One is to distinguish colour differences between images of low grade, high grade of OC and cancer as well as normal skin colours. The second part of study focuses on the colour-based data augmentation for an artificial intelligence (AI) enhanced computer diagnosis system to enlarge data set.
With regard to colour differences, all four categories overlap to a large extent. Hence it is unlikely that determination of early stage of OC can be made accurately purely based on colour changes. When training an AI system for diagnosing OC, the averaged sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy are 90.2%, 97.2% , and 95.8% respectively for classification in comparison with 85.7%, 95.6%, and 93.3% for the system trained without colour-based augmentation. Significantly, for low grade dysplasia (LGD), sensitivity and accuracy improved by over 8.1% and 4.3%, respectively
Walking (to) Greenham, again: activating feminist heritage
Get PDFThis article makes the case for the inclusion of live and performance art in commemorative practice, including specifically the artistic-activist practice of walking, in reference to the complex feminist legacies of the women’s peace camp at Greenham Common (1981-2000). Such practices offer alternatives to the impasses of public sculpture, resonate with Greenham’s feminist aesthetics and politics and prove adept to the celebration and (re-)activation of women’s movements and feminist activism. I focus on practices that seek to disentangle the collective work of activist transmission from the compromised habit of memorialization, showcasing specific performative alternatives to the commissioning of sculptural monuments. Such alternatives operate in a queer time of collectivity and gather momentum through ritual repetition, where remembrance vibrates with the energy of an embodied commitment to continue and expand the work of our chosen feminist foremothers. The practice of Jemima Brown, Elspeth Owen, Anne Robinson, and Nina Wakeford selectively deploys performance across its making and delivery, but mostly (re-)activates a kind of performativity that can never be exhausted in the act of passive spectatorship and demands sustained purchase. At a time when monuments are being toppled, ephemeral interventions prove strangely resilient and efficacious in their responsiveness and their capacity for embodied transmission across the generations and geographies of feminism. The practice of these artists proposes models of heritage-as-activation and transforms the audience into fellow actors, and even activists
Sustainable wastewater reuse for agriculture
Get PDFEffective management of water resources is crucial for global food security and sustainable development. In this Review, we explore the potential benefits and challenges associated with treated wastewater (TW) reuse for irrigation. Currently, 400 km3 yr−1 of wastewater is generated globally, but <20% is treated, and of that TW, only 2–15% is reused for irrigation depending on region. The main limitation of TW for irrigation is the inability of current treatment technologies to completely remove all micropollutants and contaminants of emerging concern, some of which have unknown impacts on crops, environment and health. However, advanced water treatment and reuse schemes, supported by water quality monitoring and regulations, can provide a stable water supply for agricultural production, as demonstrated in regions such as the USA and Israel. Such schemes could potentially serve a net energy source, as the embedded energy in wastewater exceeds treatment needs by 9 to 10 times. Agriculturally useful nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium could be also recovered and reused. TW reuse for irrigation could act as a major contributor to a circular economy and sustainable development, but the first steps will be funding and implementation of advanced and sustainable treatment technologies and social acceptance
Campus source to sink wastewater surveillance of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2)
Get PDFWastewater-based surveillance (WBS) offers an aggregate, and cost-effective approach for tracking infectious disease outbreak prevalence within communities, that provides data on community health complementary to individual clinical testing. This study reports on a 16-month WBS initiative on a university campus in England, UK, assessing the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in sewers from large buildings, downstream sewer locations, raw wastewater, partially treated and treated effluents. Key findings include the detection of the Alpha (B.1.1.7) variant in wastewater, with 70 % of confirmed campus cases correlating with positive wastewater samples. Notably, ammonium nitrogen (NH -N) levels showed a positive correlation (ρ = 0.543, < 0.01) with virus levels at the large building scale, a relationship not observed at the sewer or wastewater treatment works (WWTW) levels due to dilution. The WWTW was compliant to wastewater standards, but the secondary treatment processes were not efficient for virus removal as SARS-CoV-2 was consistently detected in treated discharges. Tools developed through WBS can also be used to enhance traditional environmental monitoring of aquatic systems. This study provides a detailed source-to-sink evaluation, emphasizing the critical need for the widespread application and improvement of WBS. It showcases WBS utility and reinforces the ongoing challenges posed by viruses to receiving water quality
Ecofeminism and the cultural affinity to genocidal capitalism: theorising necropolitical femicide in contemporary Greece
Get PDFResilient necrocapitalism and the zombie genre of representations of current dystopias are persistent in their political purpose in producing changes in the social order to benefit plutocracies around the world. It is through a thanatopolitical lens that we should view the successive losses of life, and this zombie genre has come to represent a dystopia that, for political purposes, is intended to produce changes in societies which have tolerated the violent deaths of women. This article focuses on contemporary Greece and proposes a theoretical framework where femicide is understood as a social phenomenon that reflects a global gendered necropolitical logic which equals genocide. Such theoretical assemblages have to be situated within intersectional imperatives and tacitly as the result of the capitalist terror state performed in an expansive and direct immediate death, exacerbated by the lingering slow social death of the welfare state. The article contends that the scripted hetero-patriarchal social order of the necrocapitalist state poses a unique political threat to societies. With the silence of the complicity of the state, what is necessary is the creation and spread of new political knowledge and new social movements as resilient political tactics of resistance. This article foregrounds an ecofeminist perspective on these issues and considers ways through which new pedagogies of hope can counter the gendered necropolitics of contemporary capitalism in Greece
Ways of learning and learning styles
No full textThis chapter supports students to consider the ways in which they learn and how to adopt different styles for learning
From changing childbirth to better births: a critical discourse analysis of maternity policies in the NHS
No full textRecent high-profile investigations into maternity care, by Ockendon (2022) and Kirkup (2023) have highlighted the concerns with the quality of maternity care in the NHS. The role of midwives is not immune from this and the wider discourse that now surrounds practice suggests that change is needed. However, missing from the wider debate about midwives is a discussion of how the midwifery profession is constructed. This paper uses a Policy-as-discourse stance to analyse how the role of the midwife is brought into being through policy discourse. ‘Policy documents’ were defined as written proposals emanating from the Department of Health or the NHS Executive which have had a significant impact on the development of midwifery practice in the UK. To identify documents for the discourse analysis selection criteria were that the policies appeared to have been implemented in the NHS, been publicly available since 1992 and focus on midwifery services and midwives.
Two policies were selected, Changing Childbirth (1993) and Better Births (2015) and analysed from the ‘policy as discourse’ perspective with an underlying Foucauldian approach. A Foucauldian approach facilitates a detailed investigation of the structural and linguistic features of texts in relation to other social processes, in particular how power shapes and constrains agency. The policy as a discourse perspective examines how policy constructs and position subjects, their identities and their roles within society. Analysis of the policies shows developing neoliberal discourses with strong discourses of responsibilisation, evident in the increasing rhetoric of choice and control in maternity services. Discourses of normal childbirth and the concept of continuity care develop alongside these neoliberal discourses, which position midwives as the lead professional for pregnancy as childbirth as way of increasing both quality and choice of services. As the remit of midwives, promoting continuity of care and normal childbirth furthers the professional position of midwives. These findings suggest that neoliberal discourse and the concepts of normality and continuity in policies shape professional midwifery identity. Future policy should consider the occupational boundaries that are drawn from the normal childbirth discourse and the rhetoric which embeds the current power dynamic within maternity care
How CSR communication and value co-creation shape consumer well-being and brand love in the post-COVID-19 pandemic: evidence from the UK
Get PDFPurpose – Drawing upon the Service-Dominant Logic (S-D Logic) and Elaboration likelihood model (ELM), this paper provides an integrative model to investigate how argument quality and source credibility of CSR communication affects customer value co-creation behavior, resulting in increased brand trust. Additionally, it unveils how brand trust and the perception of COVID-19 risk influence both brand love and subjective well-being.
Design/methodology/approach – The data of this study was collected through survey questionnaire from 304 coffee shop customers using convenience sampling and tested using the partial least squares structural equation modeling technique to validate its model.
Findings – The research findings confirm the positive association between source credibility and customer value co-creation (i.e. customer participation and citizenship behavior). By contrast, argument quality is revealed to have a significantly positive effect on customer citizenship behavior but a non-significant effect on customer participation behavior. Additionally, the study identifies that customer value co-creation behaviour significantly promotes brand trust. Finally, findings indicate that brand trust and the perception of COVID-19 risk significantly influence brand love and subjective well-being.
Originality /value – This study contributes to the literature on CSR communication and S-D Logic and provides new insights for marketers and advertisers to manage brands in the post-pandemic scenario through CSR communications. Furthermore, this study theoretically extends the ELM model to the CSR communication research. Finally, this study expands the relevant literature by clarifying the relationships between the perception of COVID-19 risk, brand love and subjective well-being
The hidden labour of digital capitalism: changes, continuities, critical issues
Get PDFRapid technological development means that the ground on which recent academic studies and public debates about the future of work organisation are based is shifting too rapidly for predictions to be credible. Organisational studies scholars have provided a counterpoint to this futuristic, speculative debate about the world of tomorrow with studies that contextualise seemingly new trends within a longer history of industrial capitalism. In this article, using Moritz Altenried's The Digital Factory (2022) as a starting point, I further explore the historical contextualisation of two aspects of platform capitalism: its de-spatialisation and its use of “autonomy”
Transformational sales leadership: sales leader perspectives
No full textTransformational Sales Leadership: Sales Leader Perspectives offers viewpoints from 12 leaders across the global sales industry, all of which challenge conventional sales models and promote visionary ways of thinking about sales and leadership.
The leaders who share their professional stories in the book are from organizations including SAP, Google, Nationwide US, and Royal Caribbean, as well as their own practices, and they represent a new breed of salespeople who are increasingly sought after by organizations which need to transform their practices. They run teams, drive analytics, and improve operational excellence, and their careers rise or fall on getting the right KPIs. Their stories address solutions to age-old sales problems, but they bring a new perspective to the sales function in the digital age. The book focuses on what sales leaders need in order to be innovative. Specifically, the book shows you how to:
Coach sales people through disruption
Leverage the most valuable habits for success; and
Provide for meaning and purpose in the hyper-connected and volatile sales industry
If you are a sales professional looking to succeed in challenging scenarios, the journeys recounted in this book demonstrate how the landscape of sales has changed and how thinking about sales differently can help you transform your career