Forest ecosystems and environments : Scaling up from shoot module to watershed
The Global Change Impacts on Terrestrial Ecosystems in Monsoon Asia (TEMA) project was carried out as a unique contribution to the international project Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems. TEMA aimed to integrate forest ecosystem processes. This volume presents the scaling-up concept for better understanding of ecosystem functioning.
Environmental History of the Rhine-Meuse Delta : An ecological story on evolving human–environmental relations coping with climate change and sea-level rise
This book presents the environmental history of the Delta of the lowland rivers Rhine and Meuse, an ecological story on evolving human–environmental relations coping with climate change and sea-level rise. It offers a combination of in-depth ecology and environmental history, dealing with exploitation of land and water, the use of everything nature provided, the development of fisheries and agriculture, changes in biodiversity of higher plants, fish, birds, mammals and invasive exotics. It is the first comprehensive book written in English on the integrated environmental history of the Delta, from prehistoric times up to the present day. It covers the l- acy of human intervention, the inescapable fate of reclaimed, nevertheless subs- ing and sinking polders, ‘bathtubs’ attacked by numerous floods, reclaimed in the Middle Ages and unwittingly exposed to the rising sea level and the increasing amplitude between high and low water in the rivers. The river channels, constricted and regulated between embankments, lost their flood plains, silted up, degraded and incised. Cultivation of raised bog deposits led to oxidation and compacting of peat and clay, resulting in progressive subsidence and flooding; arable land had to be changed into grassland and wetland. For millennia muscular strength and wind and water powers moulded the country into its basic form. From 1800 onwards, acceleration and scaling up by steam power and electricity, and exponential popu- tion growth, resulted in the erection of human structures ‘fixed forever’, and severe pressure on the environment.
Entrepreneurial Strategy : Starting, Managing, and Scaling New Ventures
This book focuses on explaining differences amongst organizations regarding various attributes, forms, and outcomes. By focusing on the “how” of new venture creation and management to produce well-established organizations, the authors aim to increase our understanding of the antecedents of most management research assumptions. New ventures are the source of most newly created jobs generated in an economy, new industries and markets, innovative products and services, and new solutions to economic, social, and environmental problems. However, most management research assumes a well-established organization as the starting point of their theorizing.
Econophysics of Stock and other Markets ; Proceedings of the Econophys-Kolkata II
This book reviews the latest econophysics researches on the fluctuations in stock, forex and other markets. The statistical modeling of markets, using various agent-based game theoretical approaches, and their scaling analysis have been discussed. The leading researchers in these fields have reported on their recent work and also reviewed the contemporary literature. Some historical perspectives as well as some comments and debates on recent issues in econophysics research have also been included.
Dynamics and thermodynamics with nuclear degrees of freedom
The present volume is the outcome of a community-wide review of the field of dynamics and thermodynamics with nuclear degrees of freedom which has been initiated two years ago. The achievements and the outstanding open questions are presented in 26 articles of together 61 authors and collected in six topical sections. All authors are internationally recognized experts in their fields.
Dynamical Contact Problems with Friction : Models, Methods, Experiments and Applications
The aim of this book is to describe an efficient procedure to model dynamical contact problems with friction. This procedure is applied to different practical problems and verified by experiments. Friction contacts are used to transmit forces or to dissipate energy. Examples for dynamical engineering systems with friction are brakes, machine tools, motors, turbines, bearings or wheel-rail systems. A better understanding of friction phenomena result in improvements like the reduction of noise and maintenance costs, increased life time of machines and improved energy efficiency. Dependent on the features of the dynamic system with friction contacts, different contact models and solution methods like multi-scaling methods are developed and applied.
Developing secure auto-scaling military postponement e-service in Syria
This study is about developing a secure, autoscaling military postponement e-service in Syria, that allows Syrian citizens to conveniently access services provided by the Syrian Recruitment Department conveniently through their smartphones. Currently, many Syrian citizens need to use the services offered by the Recruitment Department, resulting in overcrowding in a single location for similar purposes. This situation places a significant burden on both citizens and the government. The mobile application will facilitate various services such as enlistment and postponing military service by employing a well-designed software architecture that ensures scalability and efficient distribution of these services.
Designing Embedded Processors : A Low Power Perspective
Designing Embedded Processors examines the many ways in which processor based systems are designed to allow low power devices. It looks at processor design methods, memory optimization, dynamic voltage scaling methods, compiler methods, and multi processor methods. Each section has an introductory chapter to give a breadth view, and have a few specialist chapters in the area to give a deeper perspective. The book provides a good starting point to engineers in the area, and to research students embarking upon the exciting area of embedded systems and architectures.
Design Added Value : How Design Increases Value for Architects and Engineers
Enables architects, engineers, contractors and owner-clients of buildings to benefit from extraordinary design and construction features. It explains the rationale and motivation for D-AV methodology, outlines and illustrates this methodology with examples, provides complete and detailed examples of how the key analysis techniques work through historical case studies, and describes specific methods used in application of the D-AV methodology, such as Bayesian statistics, cost benefit analysis, pairwise comparison techniques, cognitive walkthroughs, and optimization.
Database performance at scale: a practical guide
Optimizing database performance at the scale required for today’s data-intensive applications often requires more than performance tuning and scaling out. This book shares commonly overlooked considerations, pitfalls, and opportunities that have helped many teams break through database performance plateaus. It’s neither a definitive guide to distributed databases nor a beginner’s resource. Rather, it’s a look at the many different factors that impact performance, and our top field-tested recommendations for navigating them. Chapter 1 provides two (fun and fanciful) tales that surface some of the many roadblocks you might face and highlight the range of strategies for navigating around them.
Data science in theory and practice : Techniques for big data analytics and complex data sets
Delivers a comprehensive treatment of the mathematical and statistical models useful for analyzing data sets arising in various disciplines, like banking, finance, health care, bioinformatics, security, education, and social services. Written in five parts, the book examines some of the most commonly used and fundamental mathematical and statistical concepts that form the basis of data science. The authors go on to analyze various data transformation techniques useful for extracting information from raw data, long memory behavior, and predictive modeling. Readers will also learn from topics like: Analyses of foundational theoretical subjects, including the history of data science, matrix algebra and random vectors, and multivariate analysis A comprehensive examination of time series forecasting, including the different components of time series and transformations to achieve stationarity Introductions to both the R and Python programming languages, including basic data types and sample manipulations for both languages An exploration of algorithms, including how to write one and how to perform an asymptotic analysis A comprehensive discussion of several techniques for analyzing and predicting complex data sets
Data Science and Classification
This volume provides new methodological developments in data analysis and classification. A wide range of topics is covered that includes the measurement of similarity and dissimilarity, methods for classification and clustering, network and graph analyses, analysis of symbolic data, and web mining. Apart from structural and theoretical results the book shows how to apply the proposed to a variety of problems, for example in medicine, microarray analysis, social network structures, and music. The combination of new methodological advances with the wide range of real applications collected in this volume is of special value for researchers when choosing the appropriate among newly developed analytical tools for their research problems in classification and data analysis.
Data Analysis, Classification and the Forward Search ; Proceedings of the Meeting of the Classification and Data Analysis Group (CLADAG) of the Italian Statistical Society, University of Parma, June 6-8, 2005
This book presents new developments in data analysis, classification and multivariate statistics, and in their algorithmic implementation. The volume offers contributions to the theory of clustering and discrimination, multidimensional data analysis, data mining, and robust statistics with a special emphasis on the novel Forward Search approach. Many papers provide significant insight in a wide range of fields of application. Customer satisfaction and service evaluation are two examples of such emerging fields.
Data Analysis and Decision Support
Presents advances in data analysis and decision support and gives an actual overview on the interface between mathematics, operations research, statistics, computer science, and management science. Areas that receive considerable attention in the book are discrimination and clustering, multidimensional scaling, data mining and more.
Computational earthquake physics ; Part II
Exciting developments in earthquake science have benefited from new observations, improved computational technologies, and improved modeling capabilities. Designing realistic supercomputer simulation models for the complete earthquake generation process is a grand scientific challenge due to the complexity of phenomena and range of scales involved from microscopic to global. The present volume - Part II - incorporates computational environment and algorithms, data assimilation and understanding, model applications and iSERVO. Topics covered range from iSERVO and QuakeSim: implementing the international solid earth research virtual observatory by integrating computational grid and geographical information web services; LURR (Load-Unload Response Ratio) described in six papers involving this promising earthquake forecasting model; pattern informatics and phase dynamics and their applications, which was also a highlight in the Workshop; computational algorithms, including continuum damage models and visualization and analysis of geophysical datasets; evolution of mantle material; the state vector approach; and assimilation of data such as geodetic data, GPS data, and seismicity and laboratory experimental data.
Computational earthquake physics ; Part I
The book is divided into two parts: The present volume - Part I - focuses on microscopic simulation, scaling physics, dynamic rapture and wave propagation, earthquake generation, cycle and seismic pattern. Topics covered range from numerical developments, rupture and gouge studies of the particle model, Liquefied Cracks and Rayleigh Wave Physics, studies of catastrophic failure and critical sensitivity, numerical and theoretical studies of crack propagation, developments in finite difference methods for modeling faults, long time scale simulation of interacting fault systems, modeling of crustal deformation, through to mantle convection.
Collaborative curriculum design for sustainable innovation and teacher learning
This book provides insight into what it takes to actively involve teachers in the curriculum design process. It examines different aspects of teacher involvement in collaborative curriculum design, with specific attention to its implications for sustainable curriculum innovation and teacher learning. Divided into six sections, the book starts out by introducing the notion of collaborative curriculum design and discusses its historical and theoretical foundations. It describes various approaches commonly adopted to actively involve teachers in the (co-)design of curriculum materials. Sections two and three provide examples of what key phases in the curriculum design process - such as needs analysis, design and development, and implementation - look like across various collaborative curriculum design projects. Section four reports on the impact of collaborative curriculum design on student learning, teacher practices, teacher professional growth, and institutional change. Building on the research evidence about the outcomes of collaborative curriculum design, section five focuses on sustainability, scaling-up and curriculum leadership issues, which are key to the continuation and further evolution of curriculum innovations. Future perspectives are addressed in section six with emphasis on the infrastructure of a sustainable curriculum innovation.
Classification - the ubiquitous challenge ; Proceedings of the 28th annual conference of the Gesellschaft für Klassifikation e.V., University of Dortmund, March 9-11, 2004
This volume contains revised versions of selected papers presented duringthe 28th Annual Conference of the Gesellschaft f ̈ur Klassifikation (GfKl), theGerman Classification Society. contributed papers by authors from 18countries were presented at the conference in 52 parallel sessions representingthe whole field addressed by the title of the conference “Classification: TheUbiquitous Challenge”. Among these 52 sessions the VOC organized sessionson Mixture Modelling, Optimal Scaling, Multiway Methods, and Psychomet-rics with 18 papers. Overall, presentation of the papers in this volume is arranged in the fol-lowing parts:I. (Semi-)Plenary PresentationsII. Classification and Data AnalysisIII. Applications, andIV. Contest: Social Milieus in Dortmund
Cities between competitiveness and cohesion : Discourses, realities and implementation
The book shows that spatial and urban policy continues to be a key site of policy intervention and experimentation. Different national welfare systems, political cultures, and socio-economic conditions combine and recombine to address policy problems and opportunities. Collectively, the authors argue that the examined policy initiatives reflect and reproduce these broader changes and shifting ways of thinking about the appropriate relationships between citizens, businesses, and the state.
Bioremediation of Soils Contaminated with Aromatic Compounds
Environmental biotechnology, which was in its infancy in the early 80's, has evolved thanks to the revolution brought about by molecular biology. Multiple successes in the biological cleanup of civil and industrial wastewater and of hydrocarbon soil pollution, demonstrate the vast power of clean technologies. In addition, the buildup of information on the activities of microorganisms as catalysts in all sorts of natural, industrial and animal environments has flourished. There is a continuing realization of the critical role of microbial processes in biological, industrial and geological systems. Since environmental biotechnology has matured, it is ready to tackle bigger challenges: the scaling up of many bioremediation systems still in progress, the search for novel biocatalysts for industrial applications, the continuing effort against common human life-threatening processes such as antibiotic resistance, the accumulation of hormone-mimicking substances (endocrine disrupters), the deposition of air-borne pesticides in the environment and, the degradation of recalcitrant contaminants. These endeavors will help prevent the contamination of food chains, protect human life and allow for human activity and economic development that do not compromise environmental sustainabijity.



















