In dieser Arbeit wird untersucht, wie eine theoriegeleitete Bewertung der Auslagerungseignung von Geschäftsprozessen erfolgen kann und welche Ansatzpunkte für profitables Wachstum von Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)-Anbietern in Deutschland sich aus der Nutzung einer entsprechenden Methodik ableiten lassen. Dazu wird in drei Schritten vorgegangen. In einem ersten Schritt wird ein theoretisch-konzeptionelles Bewertungsmodell zur Bestimmung der Auslagerungseignung von Geschäftsprozessen entwickelt. In einem zweiten Schritt werden Möglichkeiten einer konzeptionellen Übertragung dieses Modells auf Praxisanwendungen geprüft. Im abschließenden dritten Schritt wird gezeigt, wie die Verwendung des in dieser Arbeit entwickelten Bewertungsmodells im Rahmen der Marktbearbeitungsaktivitäten von BPO-Dienstleistern einen Beitrag zum profitablen Wachstum dieser Anbieter leisten kann.:1 Einführung: Organisationen im Wandel 1.1 Problemstellung 1.2 Zielsetzung der Arbeit und wissenschaftliche Vorgehensweise 1.3 Stand der Publikationen 2 Business Processs Outsourcing: Entwicklung, Systematisierung und Definition 2.1 Entwicklung des Business Process Outsourcing 2.2 Systematisierungsansätze für die Begriffe Sourcing und Outsourcing 2.3 Definition und Abgrenzung des Business Process Outsourcings 3 Entwicklung eines theoretisch-konzeptionellen Modells zur Bedarfsermittlung an BPO-Leistungen 3.1 Grenzen der Theorieauswahl 3.2 Vorstellung ausgewählter theoretischer Ansätze 3.3 Klassifizierung von Entscheidungsmodellen 3.4 Multikriterielle Entscheidungsmodelle 3.5 Eingrenzung der theoretischen Elemente zur Entwicklung eines BPO-Entscheidungsmodells 3.6 Entwicklung eines BPO-Entscheidungsmodells 4 Ansätze zur konzeptionellen Übertragung des BPO-Entscheidungsmodells auf Praxisanwendungen 4.1 Entwicklung einer individuellen Bewertungsmethodik 4.2 Entwicklung einer Gesamtbewertungsmethodik 4.3 Zwischenfazit 5 Ansätze für profitables Wachstum von BPO-Dienstleistern 5.1 Marktbegriffe 5.2 Marketing und Marketing-Wissenschaft 5.3 Entwicklung von Marketingansätzen für BPO-Dienstleister 6 Fazit und Ausblick 6.1 Fazit 6.2 Ausblick / In this thesis it is studied how a theory-based assessment of business processes regarding their adequacy for outsourcing can be carried out and what starting points for profitable growth of Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) providers in Germany can result from the application of such a methodology. For this purpose a three step approach is taken. As a first step a theory-based concept of an assessment model to determine the adequacy of outsourcing business processes is developed. As a second step possibilities for transferring the concept of this model to real life applications are examined. In a final third step it is shown how the assessment model developed here can be used as part of the marketing activities of BPO companies to contribute to their profitable growth.:1 Einführung: Organisationen im Wandel 1.1 Problemstellung 1.2 Zielsetzung der Arbeit und wissenschaftliche Vorgehensweise 1.3 Stand der Publikationen 2 Business Processs Outsourcing: Entwicklung, Systematisierung und Definition 2.1 Entwicklung des Business Process Outsourcing 2.2 Systematisierungsansätze für die Begriffe Sourcing und Outsourcing 2.3 Definition und Abgrenzung des Business Process Outsourcings 3 Entwicklung eines theoretisch-konzeptionellen Modells zur Bedarfsermittlung an BPO-Leistungen 3.1 Grenzen der Theorieauswahl 3.2 Vorstellung ausgewählter theoretischer Ansätze 3.3 Klassifizierung von Entscheidungsmodellen 3.4 Multikriterielle Entscheidungsmodelle 3.5 Eingrenzung der theoretischen Elemente zur Entwicklung eines BPO-Entscheidungsmodells 3.6 Entwicklung eines BPO-Entscheidungsmodells 4 Ansätze zur konzeptionellen Übertragung des BPO-Entscheidungsmodells auf Praxisanwendungen 4.1 Entwicklung einer individuellen Bewertungsmethodik 4.2 Entwicklung einer Gesamtbewertungsmethodik 4.3 Zwischenfazit 5 Ansätze für profitables Wachstum von BPO-Dienstleistern 5.1 Marktbegriffe 5.2 Marketing und Marketing-Wissenschaft 5.3 Entwicklung von Marketingansätzen für BPO-Dienstleister 6 Fazit und Ausblick 6.1 Fazit 6.2 Ausblick

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / CD4 T helper cells control immunity to pathogens and the development of inflammatory disease by acquiring the ability to secrete effector cytokines. Cytokine responsiveness is a critical component of the ability of cells to respond to the extracellular milieu by activating Signal Transducer and Activator of Transcription factors that induce the expression of other transcription factors important for cytokine production. STAT4 is a critical regulator of Th1 differentiation and inflammatory disease that attenuates the gene-repressing activity of Dnmt3a. In the absence of STAT4, genetic loss of Dnmt3a results in de-repression of a subset of Th1 genes, and a partial increase in expression that is sufficient to observe a modest recovery of STAT4-dependent inflammatory disease. STAT4 also induces expression of the transcription factors Twist1 and Etv5. We demonstrate that Twist1 negatively regulates Th1 cell differentiation through several mechanisms including physical interaction with Runx3 and impairing STAT4 activation. Following induction by STAT3-activating cytokines including IL-6, Twist1 represses Th17 and Tfh differentiation by directly binding to, and suppressing expression of, the Il6ra locus, subsequently reducing STAT3 activation. In contrast, Etv5 contributes only modestly to Th1 development but promotes Th differentiation by directly activating cytokine production in Th9 and Th17 cells, and Bcl6 expression in Tfh cells. Thus, the transcription factors Twist1 and Etv5 provide unique regulation of T helper cell identity, ultimately impacting the development of cell-mediated and humoral immunity.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / It has traditionally been posited that women show a "telescoped" development of alcohol use disorders (Kuhn, 2011). In particular, a number of clinical studies support striking sex differences in the progression from initial use of alcohol to dependence on the compound; with women showing a faster progression through landmark events associated with the development of alcohol addiction (Randall et al., 1999). However, recent studies have challenged this tenet (Keyes et al., 2010). The work presented herein was designed to determine whether females are indeed more vulnerable to the development of behavioral maladaptations following binge drinking and whether sex differences in GABA(A) receptor regulation might underlie this vulnerability. Using a mouse model of binge drinking this dissertation established that, compared to males, females escalate their binge drinking at a faster rate and maintain altered responsivity to the locomotor effects of alcohol after extended abstinence from binge drinking. Female mice also displayed significant increases in ethanol preference and intake in a continuous, two-bottle choice protocol following a shorter history of binge drinking than males. The final goal was to determine if binge drinking results in unique patterns of anxiety- or depressive-like symptoms in males and females and whether these behaviors would be associated with the dimorphic regulation of GABAA receptor subunits across the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus. Male binge drinkers displayed anxiety-like behavior during early withdrawal that dissipated after 2 weeks of abstinence. There were no significant changes in the expression of delta or gamma2 GABAA receptor subunit mRNA at this time point in the regions analyzed. Females also showed temporary anxiety-like behavior during early withdrawal from binge drinking. Additionally, females displayed significant depressive-like behavior after 2 weeks of abstinence from binge drinking. In particular, diestrus-phase females displayed significantly greater immobility in the forced-swim test after ethanol exposure and no longer maintained the reduced swim-time behavior associated with this phase of the cycle at baseline (when compared to the estrus-phase). qPCR analysis of hippocampal tissues from diestrus females supported a significant reduction in expression of gamma2 GABA(A) subunit mRNA after binge drinking. This effect was not noted for RNA isolated from hippocampal tissues taken during the estrus phase of bingers. These final data suggest possible interaction of estrous-cycle and binge drinking history that may result in the unique expression of deficits following binge drinking for females. Taken together, this work supports sex and estrous dependent effects of binge drinking on behavior and gene regulation.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / In recent years, magnesium alloys, due to their high strength and biocompatibility, have attracted significant interest in medical applications, such as cardiovascular stents, orthopedic implants, and devices. To overcome the high corrosion rate of magnesium alloys, coatings have been developed on the alloy surface. Most coating methods, such as anodic oxidation, polymer coating and chemical conversion coating, cannot produce satisfactory coating to be used in human body environment. Recent studies demonstrate that micro-arc oxidation (MAO) technique can produce hard, dense, wear-resistant and well-adherent oxide coatings for light metals such as aluminum, magnesium, and titanium. Though there are many previous studies, the understanding of processing conditions on coating performance remains elusive. Moreover, previous tests were done in simulated body fluid. No test has been done in a cell culture medium, which is much closer to human body environment than simulated body fluid. In this study, the effect of MAO processing time (1 minute, 5 minutes, 15 minutes, and 20 minutes) on the electrochemical behaviors of the coating in both conventional simulated body fluid and a cell culture medium has been investigated. Additionally a new electrolyte (12 g/L Na2SiO3, 4 g/L NaF and 4 ml/L C3H8O3) has been used in the MAO coating process. Electrochemical behaviors were measured by performing potentiodynamic polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy tests. In addition to the tests in simulated body fluid, the MAO-coated and uncoated samples were immersed in a cell culture medium to investigate the corrosion behaviors and compare the difference in these two kinds of media. The results show that in the immersion tests in conventional simulated body fluid, the 20-minute MAO coated sample has the best resistance to corrosion due to the largest coating thickness. In contrast, in the cell culture medium, all MAO coated samples demonstrate a similar high corrosion resistance behavior, independent of MAO processing time. This is probably due to the organic passive layers formed on the coating surfaces. Additionally, a preliminary finite element model has been developed to simulate the immersion test of magnesium alloy in simulated body fluid. Comparison between the predicted corrosion current density and experimental data is discussed.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Adaptive-optics optical coherence tomography (AOOCT) is a technology that has been rapidly advancing in recent years and offers amazing capabilities in scanning the human eye in vivo. In order to bring the ultra-high resolution capabilities to clinical use, however, newer technology needs to be used in the image reconstruction process. General purpose computation on graphics processing units is one such way that this computationally intensive reconstruction can be performed in a desktop computer in real-time. This work shows the process of AOOCT image reconstruction, the basics of how to use NVIDIA's CUDA to write parallel code, and a new AOOCT image reconstruction technology implemented using NVIDIA's CUDA. The results of this work demonstrate that image reconstruction can be done in real-time with high accuracy using a GPU.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The islet beta cell is unique in its ability to synthesize and secrete insulin for use in the body. A number of factors including proinflammatory cytokines, free fatty acids, and islet amyloid are known to cause beta cell stress. These factors lead to lipotoxic, inflammatory, and ER stress in the beta cell, contributing to beta cell dysfunction and death, and diabetes. While transcriptional responses to beta cell stress are well appreciated, relatively little is known regarding translational responses in the stressed beta cell. To study translation, I established conditions in vitro with MIN6 cells and mouse islets that mimicked UPR conditions seen in diabetes. Cell extracts were then subjected to polyribosome profiling to monitor changes to mRNA occupancy by ribosomes. Chronic exposure of beta cells to proinflammatory cytokines (IL-1 beta, TNF-alpha, IFN-gamma), or to the saturated free fatty acid palmitate, led to changes in global beta cell translation consistent with attenuation of translation initiation, which is a hallmark of ER stress. In addition to changes in global translation, I observed transcript specific regulation of ribosomal occupancy in beta cells. Similar to other privileged mRNAs (Atf4, Chop), Pdx1 mRNA remained partitioned in actively translating polyribosomes during the UPR, whereas the mRNA encoding a proinsulin processing enzyme (Cpe) partitioned into inactively translating monoribosomes. Bicistronic luciferase reporter analyses revealed that the distal portion of the 5’ untranslated region of mouse Pdx1 (between bp –105 to –280) contained elements that promoted translation under both normal and UPR conditions. In contrast to regulation of translation initiation, deoxyhypusine synthase (DHS) and eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A (eIF5A) are required for efficient translation elongation of specific stress relevant messages in the beta cell including Nos2. Further, p38 signaling appears to promote translational elongation via DHS in the islet beta cell. Together, these data represent new insights into stress induced translational regulation in the beta cell. Mechanisms of differential mRNA translation in response to beta cell stress may play a key role in maintenance of islet beta cell function in the setting of diabetes.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / In medical research, data analysis often requires complex statistical methods where no closed-form solutions are available. Under such circumstances, Monte Carlo (MC) methods have found many applications. In this dissertation, we proposed several novel statistical models where MC methods are utilized. For the first part, we focused on semicompeting risks data in which a non-terminal event was subject to dependent censoring by a terminal event. Based on an illness-death multistate survival model, we proposed flexible random effects models. Further, we extended our model to the setting of joint modeling where both semicompeting risks data and repeated marker data are simultaneously analyzed. Since the proposed methods involve high-dimensional integrations, Bayesian Monte Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) methods were utilized for estimation. The use of Bayesian methods also facilitates the prediction of individual patient outcomes. The proposed methods were demonstrated in both simulation and case studies. For the second part, we focused on re-randomization test, which is a nonparametric method that makes inferences solely based on the randomization procedure used in clinical trials. With this type of inference, Monte Carlo method is often used for generating null distributions on the treatment difference. However, an issue was recently discovered when subjects in a clinical trial were randomized with unbalanced treatment allocation to two treatments according to the minimization algorithm, a randomization procedure frequently used in practice. The null distribution of the re-randomization test statistics was found not to be centered at zero, which comprised power of the test. In this dissertation, we investigated the property of the re-randomization test and proposed a weighted re-randomization method to overcome this issue. The proposed method was demonstrated through extensive simulation studies.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Our connections to the digital world are invoked by brands, but the intersection of branding and interaction design is still an under-investigated area. Particularly, current websites are designed not only to support essential user tasks, but also to communicate an institution's intended brand values and traits. What we do not yet know, however, is which design factors affect which aspect of a brand. To demystify this issue, three sub-projects were conducted. The first project developed a systematic approach for evaluating the branding effectiveness of content-intensive websites (BREW). BREW gauges users' brand perceptions on four well-known branding constructs: brand as product, brand as organization, user image, and brand as person. It also provides rich guidelines for eBranding researchers in regard to planning and executing a user study and making improvement recommendations based on the study results. The second project offered a standardized perceived usability questionnaire entitled DEEP (design-oriented evaluation of perceived web usability). DEEP captures the perceived website usability on five design-oriented dimensions: content, information architecture, navigation, layout consistency, and visual guidance. While existing questionnaires assess more holistic concepts, such as ease-of-use and learnability, DEEP can more transparently reveal where the problem actually lies. Moreover, DEEP suggests that the two most critical and reliable usability dimensions are interface consistency and visual guidance. Capitalizing on the BREW approach and the findings from DEEP, a controlled experiment (N=261) was conducted by manipulating interface consistency and visual guidance of an anonymized university website to see how these variables may affect the university's image. Unexpectedly, consistency did not significantly predict brand image, while the effect of visual guidance on brand perception showed a remarkable gender difference. When visual guidance was significantly worsened, females became much less satisfied with the university in terms of brand as product (e.g., teaching and research quality) and user image (e.g., students' characteristics). In contrast, males' perceptions of the university's brand image stayed the same in most circumstances. The reason for this gender difference was revealed through a further path analysis and a follow-up interview, which inspired new research directions to unpack even more the nexus between branding and interaction design.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / A sizeable body of research has attempted to examine the interaction between government spending and private giving known as the crowd-out effect. Most researchers reported that increases of government spending cause decreases of philanthropic giving to different types of nonprofits. However, few studies have attempted to indicate the interaction between government welfare expenditures and private giving to human service organizations even though human service organizations are the most sensitive to the changes of government spending. Additionally, the estimated crowd-out effects with a simple crowd-out model have been criticized for potential endogeneity bias. This paper investigates the total effect of federal government welfare spending on state government expenditures and philanthropic giving to human service organizations (known as joint crowd-out). I used the 2005 wave of the Center on Philanthropy Panel Study (COPPS) to estimate the effect of federal human service grants on state government spending on, and donations to human services. From these reduced-form estimates I infer the levels of simple and joint crowd-out. I found that indicate federal spending on public welfare crowds out private giving to human service organizations while holding control variables constant in the donations equation. However, federal government spending on public welfare crowds in state government spending on public welfare.