130,564 research outputs found
MeSH term explosion and author rank improve expert recommendations
No full textInformation overload is an often-cited phenomenon that reduces the productivity, efficiency and efficacy of scientists. One challenge for scientists is to find appropriate collaborators in their research. The literature describes various solutions to the problem of expertise location, but most current approaches do not appear to be very suitable for expert recommendations in biomedical research. In this study, we present the development and initial evaluation of a vector space model-based algorithm to calculate researcher similarity using four inputs: 1) MeSH terms of publications; 2) MeSH terms and author rank; 3) exploded MeSH terms; and 4) exploded MeSH terms and author rank. We developed and evaluated the algorithm using a data set of 17,525 authors and their 22,542 papers. On average, our algorithms correctly predicted 2.5 of the top 5/10 coauthors of individual scientists. Exploded MeSH and author rank outperformed all other algorithms in accuracy, followed closely by MeSH and author rank. Our results show that the accuracy of MeSH term-based matching can be enhanced with other metadata such as author rank
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
No full textThe 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
"Closing the R&D Gap, Evaluating the Sources of R&D Spending"
No full textBoth spending and tax policies have been implemented in the United States with the goal of stimulating private sector research and development (R&D). Karier questions whether current R&D policy, especially the research and experimentation tax credit, can contribute to closing the gap between nondefense expenditures on R&D in the United States and such expenditures in other countries, such as Japan and Germany. He also explores possible changes to our current R&D policy to make it more effective.
Paving the way to new nanocomposite materials: multiscale computer simulations of PEO and exfoliated layer silicates in aqueous dispersions
No full textA combined experimental/computational approach to the characterization of polymer-clay nanocomposites based on PEO-diacrylate macromolecules
No full textDispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
No full textWe 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
Connecting deterministic and numerical methods to better estimate the probability of flooding for clay dikes
No full textDikes protect people and lands all around the globe. With rising sea levels, the importance of well-designed dikes has never been more essential. One of the main factors that can compromise the stability of dikes are macro-instabilities. Macro-instabilities can cause dikes to lose their water bearing potential, leading to floods. Methods are developed to as accurately as possible determine the probability that a macro-instability takes place in order to prevent it. Therefore, recent advancements include the remaining strength after macro-instability, which may be able to prevent flooding. The foremost methods to determine this remaining strength after macro-instability use D-Stability or the Material Point Method (MPM). Both D-Stability and MPM have advantages and disadvantages. D-Stability can quickly determine the probability that a macro-instability takes place, but cannot model the process of failure, and must therefore simplify this process to estimate the remaining strength. MPM on the other hand can accurately model what happens after a macro-instability, but has a much larger computational cost, especially for probabilistic computations. By supplementing D-Stability and MPM, this thesis proposes a method that exploits the advantages of both methods and mitigates the disadvantages. For a dike with a single clay layer, a connection was made between D-Stability and MPM, allowing dike profiles to be transferred back and forth. In order to make this connection, the SHANSEP undrained shear strength model was successfully implemented in MPM. By using the quick probabilistic D-Stability calculation and the post-failure modeling option of MPM, the probability of failure and the effect of failure can be quickly determined. By taking into account the effect of failure, the method can determine the probability of flooding, without simplifying the failure process. The method can also be used to determine if flooding via retrogressive failure or a larger single instability is more likely. The method was tested via a case study and verified via a RMPM Monte Carlo analysis. For the case study, the probability of flooding was 5.189*10-3 compared to an initial probability of failure of 7.22*10-1, a reduction in the order of 139. This probability of flooding compared well to the probability of flooding of 5.308*10-3computed using the more accurate and computationally expensive RMPM. Based on these first results, the proposed method is a viable method to assess the probability of flooding after macro-instability for clay dikes.Civil Engineerin
A Multivariate Surface-Based Analysis of the Putamen in Premature Newborns: Regional Differences within the Ventral Striatum
No full textMany children born preterm exhibit frontal executive dysfunction, behavioral problems including attentional deficit/hyperactivity disorder and attention related learning disabilities. Anomalies in regional specificity of cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical circuits may underlie deficits in these disorders. Nonspecific volumetric deficits of striatal structures have been documented in these subjects, but little is known about surface deformation in these structures. For the first time, here we found regional surface morphological differences in the preterm neonatal ventral striatum. We performed regional group comparisons of the surface anatomy of the striatum (putamen and globus pallidus) between 17 preterm and 19 term-born neonates at term-equivalent age. We reconstructed striatal surfaces from manually segmented brain magnetic resonance images and analyzed them using our in-house conformal mapping program. All surfaces were registered to a template with a new surface fluid registration method. Vertex-based statistical comparisons between the two groups were performed via four methods: univariate and multivariate tensor-based morphometry, the commonly used medial axis distance, and a combination of the last two statistics. We found statistically significant differences in regional morphology between the two groups that are consistent across statistics, but more extensive for multivariate measures. Differences were localized to the ventral aspect of the striatum. In particular, we found abnormalities in the preterm anterior/inferior putamen, which is interconnected with the medial orbital/prefrontal cortex and the midline thalamic nuclei including the medial dorsal nucleus and pulvinar. These findings support the hypothesis that the ventral striatum is vulnerable, within the cortico-stiato-thalamo-cortical neural circuitry, which may underlie the risk for long-term development of frontal executive dysfunction, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and attention-related learning disabilities in preterm neonates. © 2013 Shi et al
Scholarly Communication and Publishing Lunch and Learn Talk #11: The ULS Open Access Author Fee Fund
No full textAt the May 2014 talk, you will learn about the ULS Open Access Author Fee Fund--what it is, why we do it, how it works, and how the program is going so far
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