1,721,074 research outputs found
Efficiency indicators versus frontier methods: an empirical investigation of Italian public hospitals
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Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Sex Differences in the ECG Interpretation: A Functional Data Analysis Perspective
Full text linkPrompt diagnosis and correct therapy are essential for the treatment of cardiovascular diseases. A proper evaluation of electrocardiography (ECG) tracings could help to analyze the different effects of drug therapies in men and women and therefore would allow the prescription of more specific drugs and dosages. For this purpose, it is essential to know the morphology of the ECG and to know how to read it correctly. In recent years there has been an increasing awareness of the differences between a male and female ECG trace and, therefore, of the need to take them into account to obtain a correct diagnosis. This work proposes a method for the recognition of the subject's sex starting from the morphology of the ECG trace alone to highlight sex differences. This technique employs Functional Data Analysis (FDA), a statistical approach specifically developed for the analysis of curves and surfaces. We proved the adequacy of our method by evaluating its ability to classify the traces correctly and is proposed as a smart analysis tool to be employed in the development of ad hoc cardiac drugs. The procedure foresees a preprocessing of the signal through a Butterworth filtering, wavelet-based smoothing, and alignment of the traces. We then classify the signals through a cluster analysis in the form of multivariate functional k-mean procedures. The result is a semi-Automatic assignment of the sex of the subject to which the ECG belongs. The method reaches better performances when considering younger subjects because morphological differences between sexes are more evident in this subpopulation, as previously highlighted in literature. More specifically, the accuracy is 77.8% in the younger population and 71.4% in elderly subjects. The technique hereby proposed is a valuable tool for the exploration of ECG tracings to be employed in clinical and pharmacological research
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Leptin in Tumor Microenvironment
No full textLeptin is a hormone that plays a major role as mediator of long-term regulation of energy balance, suppressing food intake, and stimulating weight loss. More recently, important physiological roles other than controlling appetite and energy expenditure have been suggested for leptin, including neuroendocrine, reparative, reproductive, and immune functions. These emerging peripheral roles let hypothesize that leptin can modulate also cancer progression. Indeed, many studies have demonstrated that elevated chronic serum concentrations of leptin, frequently seen in obese subjects, represent a stimulatory signal for tumor growth. Current knowledge indicates that also different non-tumoral cells resident in tumor microenvironment may respond to leptin creating a favorable soil for cancer cells. In addition, leptin is produced also within the tumormicroenvironment creating the possibility for paracrine and autocrine action. In this review, we describe the main mechanisms that regulate peripheral leptin availability and how leptin can shape tumor microenvironment
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Articolo 94
No full textNel contributo l'autore svolge un commento dell'art. 94 Cost., esaminando la ratio della disposizione costituzionale anche alla luce dei lavori preparatori dell'Assemblea costituente. Parte del commento è dedicato all'analisi diacronica del funzionamento della forma di governo italiana, in connessione con il mutare del sistema politico-partitico. L'ultima parte ripercorre brevemente le principali proposte di riforma costituzionale discusse in Parlamento, evidenziando i nodi ancora irrisolti della forma di governo nazionale
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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